Nanjing: The unseeded Goh Jin Wei of Malaysia had closed the gap in her career head-to-head meeting against Aya Ohori of Japan to 1-2 after she defeated Ohori 21-18, 22-20 in the second round of World Championships on Wednesday.
With the elimination of Soniia Cheah in the second round, Goh Jin Wei, who became the sole Malaysian women’s singles representative left at the championships, got off to a strong start when she took the first set 21-18. Goh showed impressive resilience as she clawed back from 15-18 in the second set to lead at 20-18. However, she wasted two match points and allowed Ohori to level at 20-20 before Goh took advantage of Ohori’s mistakes to win the match in 42 minutes.
“I didn’t expect to win the match, I felt very lucky as Ohori started to make mistakes in the second set when the score was at 20-20,” said Goh.
“I will probably be going to play against the defending champion Nozomi Okuhara tomorrow, and I’ll be ready to play for three hours,” said Goh Jin Wei jokingly.
Aya Ohori had recently defeated Goh in the second round of 2018 All England. She also won in the fourth round of 2014 BWF World junior championships against Goh.
The No. 8 seed Nozomi Okuhara was barely troubled by Rachel Honderich of Canada in the second round, seeing off the Canadian 21-11, 21-9 in 28 minutes.
Meanwhile, the top-ranked Tai Tzu Ying of Taiwan who defeated Australian Hsuan-yu Chen, 21-10, 21-16 in her first match at the badminton world championships on Tuesday, will take on No. 12 seed Zhang Beiwen of USA in the next round.
In women’s doubles, No. 13 seeds Chow Mei Kuan/Lee Meng Yean of Malaysia saved a match point, rallied from behind to outlast unseeded Isabel Herttrich/Carla Nelte of Germany 16-21, 21-17, 22-20. Chow/Lee are set to meet No. 5 seeds Greysia Polii/Apriyani Rahayu of Indonesia on Thursday.
