BWF World Championships 2018 LIVE: Chen – Viktor Delivered Nail-Biting Match

The Chinese legend Chen Long avenged his loss – from last season’s Semi Finals – against the World No. 1 Viktor Axelsen in the Quarter-Finals at the BWF World Championships 2018 in Nanjing, China.

Chen took almost one hour to oust the Dane in the straight sets with 21-19, 21-11.

Starting with an early lead of 4-0, the 35-year-old Chen with deceptions and accurate baseline judgements, mastered the rallies with all his experience over the 24-year-old to seal the first game.

In the second game, Chen never let Viktor to his reach and maintained the huge gap by the pinnacle point.

Previously, the third seed chinese Shi Yuqi entered Semi-Finals after losing the match of three sets in the round-of-eight against Chou Tien Chen of Taipei in the contest of 72 minutes.

The Chinese who could win the first game with the lead of 14-11, remained stranded as his opponent cruised with 7 points straight and the game.

In the second game, Shi improved with the points from 6-4 to 13-4, but Chou somehow managed to catch his opponent with the trail of 14-16.

Shi played a slothy game with the huge gap of points against the Taipei player. However, third seeded Shi changed the gear to level the score at 16-16, followed by winning three points straight.

Chou could pull off another point before succumbing to the Chinese.
What an incredible victory by the World No. 3 and Indian Olympic winner P.V Sindhu who delivered a smashing performance against the Japanese powerhouse Nozomi Okuhara. The 58-minute long nail-biting match was a series of interesting rallies, cross court drops, ferocious backhand smashes and tactful deceiving shots.

Sindhu’s sheer confidence and composure on court outplayed Nozomi’s wit and tact as the talented champ wrapped up the match with a winning score line of 21-17, 21-19. In both of sets, Nozomi was strong enough to beat the Indian opponent, however, Sindhu’s patience and psych reading worked well in her favour as she got in the flow and acted smart.

In Men’s Singles, Sai Praneeth played well but he went down giving a good run to the Japanese maestro Kento Momoto in a 38-minute neck-to-neck match. Sai Praneeth lost the game in a 21-12, 21-12 score.

It is really a good day for the Chinese Mixed Doubles players as they scripted the Quarter-Finals with the most wins at the BWF World Championships 2018 in Nanjing, China.

Lower seeded Zhang Nan and Li Yinhui beat the Danes Mathias Christiansen and Christinna Pedersen with 21-15, 22-20 in the match that lasted for 53 minutes.

The Chinese who trailed at the first-half of the opening game with 7-11 raced towards the lead with 6 straight points followed by grabbing the game into their account. And the second game was a neck-to-neck encounter, which was justified by the Chinese.

In another Mixed Doubles match, India’s Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Ashwini Ponnappa end their challenge after they lost to the top seeded Chinese Zheng Siwei and Huang Yaqiong with 17-21, 10-21 in the Quarter-Finals.

Satwik and Ashwini are the only unseeds pair left in the mixed doubles event who were never given a chance to rally down the court from the outset.

The runner-up at the Worlds in 2017, Zheng, was in good form in the back court while Yaqiong was very aggressive at the net. The cohesive pair poached well by mixing up the pace from back and at the net.

With all her experience, Ashwini gathered herself into the game, while the teenager Satwik betrayed a few nerves with a couple of service faults and overhit smashes in the opening game. But as the match progressed, the junior picked up well which helped the senior to narrow the gap with 17-18.

Later, service error from Satwik costed the game.

There was one way traffic from the top seeds, who cruised to a slender lead of 11-4. The Chinese pair closed the game with the comfortable win from Satwik’s errors, yet again.

In another match, the English pair Chris Adcock and Gabrielle Adcock lost to the Chinese star players Wang Yilyu and Huang Dongping with 13-21, 18-21 in the match of 44 minutes.

The highlight of the match was the battle-of-smashes between the teams.