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Gade and Chen Advance to Quarter-Finals
Former world number one Peter Gade and reigning All England champion Chen Jin moved into the last eight of the Beijing Olympics men's singles badminton competition with contrasting victories.
| Gade, the veteran Dane who is seeded number eight, had to come from behind and then endure a tense middle game before beating Japan's Shoji Sato 19-21, 22-20, 21-15. His next match is against the world number one and favourite from China, Lin Dan, who is also the top seed. Chen sealed his place in the last eight by beating France's Erwin Kehlhoffner 21-10, 21-6 and now meets Taiwan's Hsieh Yu-hsing, who stunned Malaysia's veteran world number 15 Wong Choong Hann. Wong had done the hard work in knocking out defending Olympic champion Taufik Hidayat in an earlier match. But he failed in what was supposed to be an easier task, allowing Hsieh to fight back and score a 14-21, 21-17, 21-18. Lin passed a major test of his gold medal credentials when he swept past South Korea's Asian champion Park Sunghwan in the round of 16. Park was expected to provide Lin with one of his most difficult match but instead wilted 21-8, 21-11 in 41 minutes. Other intriguing quarter-final matches await the fans at the Beijing Technological University gymnasium on Thursday. Malaysia's Lee Chong Wei, the world number two who is seen as the greatest threat to Lin, faces a tough match against the sixth seed from Indonesia Sony Dwi Kuncoro, who won a bronze medal four years ago in Athens. Third-seeded Chinese Bao Chunlai plays South Korean ace Lee Hyun-il in another potentially explosive quarter-final. Bao, the world number three, was surprisingly stretched by Poland's Przemyslaw Wacha before winning 21-11, 19-21, 21-13 in his previous match. Korean Open champion Lee Hyun-il, meanwhile, needed only 31 minutes to eliminate German Marc Zwiebler 21-13, 21-11. Meanwhile, it is the semi-final stage in the women's doubles with China guaranteed at least one team in the final. Second seeds Du Jin and Yu Yang will face off with their third-seeded compatriots Wei Yili and Zhang Yawen. In the other semi-finals, Japanese giant-killers Miyuki Maeda and Satoko Suetsuna face a hard time against fourth-seeded Korean pair Lee Hyo-jung and Lee Kyung-won. The Japanese duo stunned the top seeds from China Yang Wei and Zhang Jiewen in three games in their quarter-final clash and have nothing to lose against the Koreans. |
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