Fuzhou: Revenge proved sweet for Malaysia’s World No. 33 men’s singles player Iskandar Zulkarnain Zainuddin as he battled past reigning Korean Open champion Qiao Bin with a 21-19, 21-7 victory over the Chinese in Friday’s China Open quarter-finals.
Qiao had won their past encounter back in September at the Korea Open when Qiao Bin defeated Zainuddin 21-13, 21-19.
The unseeded Zainuddin is set to play No. 6 seed Jan Jorgensen of Denmark next. Jorgensen completed a hard-fought win over Tian Houwei of China, winning 14-21, 21-16, 21-14 in other men’s singles quarter-finals match.
No. 2 seed Chen Long of China and No. 3 seed Viktor Axelsen will play each other in the other men’s semi-final.
In the women’s competition, No. 5 seed Tai Tzu Ying of Taiwan rallied to upset No. 1 seed Carolina Marin of Spain with 21-10, 22-20 in 36 minutes. Tai will play No. 8 seed Sun Yu of China on Saturday for a place in the final.
Meanwhile, mixed doubles No. 5 seeds Zheng Siwei/Chen Qingchen failed to maintain their recent red-hot forms, knocked out by compatriots Zhang Nan/Li Yinhui 21-18, 20-22, 17-22 in 63 minutes.
Zhang Nan/Li Yinhui will face an uphill battle in the semi-finals against No. 1 seeds Ko Sung Hyun/Kim Ha Na of Korea on Saturday.
