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(Photo: Badmintonphoto)
Race for the medals at the World Championships
Date: 8/25/2022 4:45 PM
Published by : Thomas Fuchs (BEC)
It’s day four of the BWF World Championships and we have seen some great performances in Tokyo, Japan so far. In tomorrow’s quarterfinals, the best of the best will fight for the medals in each discipline. We will break down the highlights of each competition for you from a European perspective:

Men’s doubles: English pair kicks out top-seed
The day kicked off as early as 3:00 (CET) with the European Champions Mark Lamsfuss and Marvin Seidel facing the world’s no.3 and three-time World Champions Hendra Setiawan and Mohammad Ahsan from Indonesia. Before the game, the Germans were quite optimistic as they had beaten the ‘Daddies’ in their last meeting at the Denmark Open 2021. 

“We will go for the medal for sure. We will try to beat them in the next round and just look at it game by game, as every game can be the last one”, said Marvin Seidel after reaching the quarterfinals yesterday. 

And at some point during the game, it looked quite good for Lamsfuss and Seidel. After losing the first game 18-21 the Germans started the second game with a 9-3 run. But at 15-15, the Indonesian pair took the lead and earned themselves three match points at 20-17. Seidel and Lamsfuss managed to tie the game at 20-20 but eventually lost 20-22 in the end. 

Other than the Germans, Ben Lane and Sean Vendy managed to overcome a top-seeded Indonesian pair today as they kicked out world’s no.1 Marcus Gideon and Kevin Sukamuljo. 

“We had a game plan and could stick to it very well. They probably didn’t play their best game. But they are both amazing players and I’m sure they’ll be back”, Ben Lane said after winning 21-15 21-9 in just 26 minutes. In their first quarterfinal at the World Championships, the English will again face a pair from Indonesia. They will try to repeat their great performance against Fajar Alfian and Muhammad Rian Ardianto.

With Adam Hall and Alexander Dunn from Scotland as well as Jeppe Bay and Lasse Mølhede from Denmark, there were two more European men's doubles in the race, but both lost to their respective opponents today in two games.

Women’s doubles: Stoeva sisters won’t be moving forward
In women’s doubles, we will head into quarterfinals day without any Europeans left on the draw. Maiken Fruergaard and Sara Thygesen from Denmark lost to the top-seeded Chen Qing Chen and Jia Yi Fan from China 15-21 9-21. It was the sixth time for those pairs to compete and the Chinese managed to win in straight games every single time. 

After that, all European hopes in women’s doubles were on the European Champions Gabriela and Stefani Stoeva from Bulgaria. The no. 8 seeds were lacing up against Puttita Supajirakul and Sapsiree Taerattanachai from Thailand whom they were able to beat the last two times they played each other. Unfortunately, the Thais turned out as too strong today taking a 21-13 21-12 victory and moving on to the quarterfinals.

Mixed doubles: European Champs beat World Champs 
We saw three European mixed doubles competing in the round of 16 today but only one pair made it to the quarterfinals. The European Champions, Mark Lamsfuss and Isabel Lohau from Germany, were taking on the reigning World Champions, Dechapol Puavaranukroh and Sapsiree Taerattanachai from Thailand, in a thrilling matchup. 

As the no.2-seeded Thais had won all their six previous battles, most spectators were awaiting the same today. However, Mark Lamsfuss and Isabel Lohau came out strong taking the first game 21-16 and they continued after the break, starting a huge 9-1-run after the score was 3-3. Even though the Thais were trying their best, the Germans didn’t let go and advanced to the quarterfinals winning 21-14 after 38 minutes. 

“They always put a lot of pressure on us. The last few times we played them, we had a little too much respect. Today we could put up some pressure on them and get the attack”, said Isabel Lohau after the game. 

Thom Gicquel and Delphine Delrue from France as well as Robin Tabeling and Selena Piek from the Netherlands could not win their matches and dropped out of the World Championships in the round of 16. 

Men’s singles: Axelsen can’t be stopped
Another day, another two-game win for no.1 seed Viktor Axelsen. The Dane kept his winning streak alive beating Sitthikom Thammasin from Thailand, 21-19 21-16. The Thai almost completed a huge comeback in the first game when he was down 13-20 and came as close as 19-20 before Axelsen ended his streak. 

In the second game, the Dane took control early on and was leading the entire game before he closed it out 21-16 after 49 minutes of playing time. In tomorrow’s quarterfinals, Axelsen will play Anthony Ginting from Indonesia who took out Shi Yu Qi from China after a 61-minute battle. 

Women’s singles: Marin fights back
It looked like Carolina Marin could not stand up to China’s He Bing Jiao at the end of the third game. Still, Marin, who had lost the first game 16-21 and won the second game 21-15, never stopped believing. The three-times World Champion from Spain was already trailing 16-20 before she started her final run. Accompanied by her usual loud cheers, she caught up point by point and finally turned the match around at 22:20. 

“I feel happy with myself. Mainly because I pushed myself to keep fighting until the end. This victory gives me the confidence to face other top players”, Marin said.

She will need that confidence tomorrow when she faces none other than reigning world champion and top seed Akane Yamaguchi of Japan. 

Find all results from today’s matches at the BWF World Championships 2022 here
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