KUALA LUMPUR – Two national men’s singles players, Lee Zii Jia and Ng Tze Yong, put up excellent performances to advance to the quarter-finals of the 2023 Australian Open badminton tournament today.

More interestingly, the two players will play against each other to book a slot to the semi-finals, thus making their battle awaited to determine who is more deserving of being called the country’s top men’s singles player at the moment.

Earlier in today’s second round, Zii Jia, who is currently ranked 17th in the world, brushed aside the challenge of Mithun Manjunath of India in 21-13, 12-21, 21-19 at the Quaycentre court in Sydney.

The victory sees Zii Jia meet Tze Yong who upset world number five player from Indonesia, Jonatan Christie 22-20, 21-15 to advance to the quarter-finals, tomorrow.

For the record, Zii Jia and Tze Yong, who is ranked 21st in the world, have never faced each other in any international tournament before.

Meanwhile, a different fate befell national men’s doubles pair Ong Yew Sin-Teo Ee Yi who lost to Taiwan’s Lee Yang-Wang Chi-Lin 21-18, 17-21, 19-21.

Mixed doubles pair Chen Tang Jie-Toh Ee Wei also suffered the same fate when they lost to the Indonesian pair of Renov Revaldy-Pitha Haningtyas Mentari 16-21, 21-17, 19-21.

Other results:

(Malaysians unless stated)

Mixed doubles:

[3] Seo Seung Jae-Chae Yu Jung (KOR) bt Hoo Pang Ron- Teoh Mei Xing 22-20, 11-21, 21-12

Hiroki Midorikawa-Natsu Saito (JPN) bt [2] Goh Soon Huat- Lai Shevon Jemie 21-17, 21-18, 17-21

– BERNAMA