World champions knocked out on Day Two
The men’s and mixed doubles world champions were knocked out on Day Two of the YONEX All England Open Badminton Championships 2024.
Seo Seung Jae suffered double heartbreak as he lost his men’s doubles first-round match with Kang Min Hyuk and his mixed doubles match alongside Chae Yu Jung.
He Ji Ting and Ren Xiang Yu of China triumphed 21-14 21-13 in the men’s doubles needing just 35 minutes to beat the third seeds.
The two pairs had met last week at the YONEX French Open with the Koreans winning in straight games en route to the semi-finals.
“We’re very glad that we can win this against the world champions and it is a nice revenge and huge confidence boost for us as well,” He Ji Ting said.
“We watched our previous match against them with our coach and the things that we didn’t do quite well, I think we did pretty well today.”
In the mixed doubles, Ye Hong Wei and Lee Chia Hsin of Chinese Taipei advanced with a 21-17 21-10 win in less than 30 minutes.
🥹 Find yourself a teammate like Ye Hong Wei 🥹
👋 We thought the Chinese Taipei star had injured his hand in practice. But no – he did it while helping his team carry their luggage! 🧳
👏 What a gentleman 👏#YAE24 #AllOfBadminton pic.twitter.com/chT9vy65w9
— 🏆 Yonex All England Badminton Championships 🏆 (@YonexAllEngland) March 13, 2024
Ye and Lee beat last year’s losing finalists and will face Supak Jomkoh and Supissara Paewsampran of Thailand.
Lee said: “We didn’t think too much about who we were playing because we have a few pairs to compete against still and each match will be difficult.
“We were just focused on the moment and will play it match by match.”
All of the defending All England champions in action on day two made it through with women’s singles champion An Se Young of Korea winning in straight games.
For the second year in a row, the No.1 seed beat Chinese Taipei’s Wen Chi Hsu in the first round, advancing 21-17 21-16.
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Defending women’s doubles champions Kim So Yeong and Kong Hee Yong of Korea advanced after their opponents Li Yi Jing and Luo Xu Min of China retired with the game at 21-14 4-5.
Fajar Alfian and Muhammad Rian Ardianto, the men’s doubles champions, sailed through to the second round beating Fang-Chih Lee and Fang-Jen Lee 21-13 21-9.
Alfian said: “We know our opponents are really good and, in our head-to-head, they lead 2-1 so we had to be careful and play really well.”
Three-time women’s singles champion Tai Tzu Ying was a comfortable winner against Nozomi Okuhara of Japan.
😊 It’s always nice to see the great Tai Tzu Ying! ❤️
🏆 At what could be her final YONEX All England Open, could she win a fourth women’s singles crown? #YAE24 #AllOfBadminton pic.twitter.com/nwkBt5uxg7
— 🏆 Yonex All England Badminton Championships 🏆 (@YonexAllEngland) March 13, 2024
The third seed from Chinese Taipei won 21-11 21-16 and looks to add a fourth crown to her collection having won in 2017, 2018 and 2020.
Another former champion made it through in the men’s singles as 2021 champion Lee Zii Jia knocked out Japan’s Kodai Naraoka who entered the first round as the sixth seed and world silver medallist.
Three-time mixed doubles champions Yuta Watanabe and Arisa Higashino came through an all-Japanese clash, beating Kyohei Yamashita and Naru Shinoya 21-12 21-16.
Women’s doubles top seeds Chen Qing Chen and Jia Yi Fan of China were the last match on court and secured a 21-10 15-21 21-16 against Chinese Taipei’s Hsu Ya Ching and Lin Wan Ching.
Be part of All The Action at the All England. Tickets are still available at allenglandbadminton.com. Can’t be in Birmingham this week? You can still see badminton’s most prestigious tournament play out on BBC Sport and TNT Sports. Don’t miss a minute!
