Day 4 of the 2007 16th World Championships recorded a total of 8 upsets: 3 in each of men’s singles and doubles and 1 in each of mixed doubles and women’s singles. These include the eradication of the 2nd seeds in both the men’s and women’s singles event.

The interesting aspect of the series of upsets in the 3rd round matches of the World Championship is how a total of 8 different countries had their fair share of glory in the 8 upsets.

It was the Koreans who got the ball rolling. 13th seeds Jung Jae Sung/Lee Yong Dae beat world No. 4 Jens Eriksen/Martin Lundgaard Hansen in straight sets, 21-17, 21-15.

The Danes seemed to have their way in the beginning of the first set but once the Koreans geared into the rhythm of their game, the two pairs became inseparable. The Koreans’ powerful smashes and clever placing of the shuttle were their weapons in nicking the first game.

From the beginning of the 2nd game, Jung/Lee secured their lead through a series of outstanding attacks. The Danes were often seen rooted to the spot as the Koreans were targeting their smashes either to their bodies or in between both players.

The game could still have gone either way as Eriksen/Lunggaard put up a good fight and never allowed the Koreans to lead by a wide margin. But at the critical 18-15 score line, Lundgaard had to get himself a yellow card and that unsettled the Danes, who were not able to recover from then on but were instead sent packing.

Poles Once Again Make Their Presence Felt

At the conclusion of the first of the day's eight upsets, waves were felt in the adjacent court. Chinese pair He Hanbin/Yu Yang, the 7th seeds in mixed doubles, were shown their way out of the tournament by the less well-known Polish pair Robert Mateusiak/Nadiezda Kostiuczyk. The Chinese lost 21-19, 17-21, 13-21.

He/Yu could already sense the danger as the first game was a nail-biting affair throughout and they were lucky to get away with the win.

In the second game, the Poles took a half-time lead, which they kept until at 15-10, the Chinese managed to close in to even things up 15-15. But it was all they could do to keep up with the Poles, who pressed on to take the game into a tiebreaker.

In the deciding game, the Polish pair had healthy 4 to 5-point lead from the start. As the game progressed, the gap widened and the Poles reached match point at a comfortable 20-13. With a perfect topple over the net by the conscientious Nadiezda, the Polish stormed into the 16th World Championships quarterfinals.

China’s Unseeded Men’s Doubles Guo/Xie Take 2nd Upset

Guo Zhendong/Xie Zhongbo were Malaysia’s party spoiler last night when they annihilated the home favourites Abdul Latif/Mohd Tazari 21-14, 21-13. They continued their killing ways today as they prevented 14th seeded Joko Riyadi/Hendra A. Gunawan of Indonesia from advancing into the quarterfinals.

In a thrilling 3-set victory of 22-20, 16-21, 21-16, Guo/Xie played a solid match against the Indonesians in the first set. It was a neck-and-neck chase, which the Chinese finally took over to clinch the first set.

Riyadi/Gunawan cleverly turned the tables in the second game but they could not follow through with that performance to the final game, when they were plague with unforced errors. As a result, the seeded Indonesians had to surrender their ticket to the quarterfinals to the unseeded Chinese.

Japanese Send Indonesians Flying And Diving

Indonesia lost another men’s doubles pair in the same day when their 8th seeded men’s doubles pair, Luluk Hadiyanto/Alvent Yulianto, were beaten by the 16th seeded Japanese pair Shuichi Sakamoto/Shintaro Ikeda (pictured right) in 3 sets, 21-19, 22-24, 21-15.

The two pairs were hardly differentiated in the first two sets though, in the first game, Sakamoto/Ikeda led 15-8 at one point. However, the Indonesians successfully closed the gap to 16-16 and again at 19-19. In a match where the Indonesians were sent diving and flying, the Japanese came out on top 21-19.

The 2nd game was literally a point-to-point chase for both pairs. Hadiyanto/Yulianto, had a bit more luck on their side and secured the evenly-fought second game 24-22. In the deciding game, however, the Indonesians failed to keep up with the pace dictated by the Japanese and fell behind from the start. Eventually, Sakamoto/Ikeda came out big winners 21-15.

Men’s Singles Draw Loses 2nd and 3rd Seeds Within 5 hours

Just as it seemed like Singapore’s Ronald Susilo’s shocking defeat of 3rd seed Chen Jin was to be the upset of the day, it was arguably not. 5 hours later, on the very same court, a bigger upset was staged when the 2nd seed in the men’s singles event was dropped.

Local hero Lee Chong Wei was also easily eliminated on home soil by Indonesia’s Sony Dwi Kuncoro (pictured above), seeded 9th in this year’s Championships. Chong Wei, who was simply not himself today, went down tamely 21-11, 21-9.

The recent Philippine Open 2007 champion gave away points too easily through his series of unforced errors. All his tactics were also cracked by Sony, who also seemed unusually relaxed on the court this evening.

“I think what allowed me to win the game was my confidence and belief in myself. I really believe that I can win this game. I was the one who controlled the game from the start. I think it was very important because I started gaining confidence for the game. If he had been the one controlling the game from the first, maybe it would have been a different story altogether.

"Lee Chong Wei on the other hand made so many unforced errors. I could also read his tactics very well, and whenever he changed tactics, it never seemed to work for him.

"I have actually no special preparation for playing against Lee Chong Wei. I just don’t want to put pressure on myself so that I can relax during the game. What’s most important is the confidence."

Sony will be the only men’s singles shuttler from Indonesia who is still in the race for the title. He will face Peter Gade from Denmark, who beat the Indonesian’s compatriot Simon Santoso earlier today.

Host Malaysia, on the other hand, will not have any representatives in the men’s singles quarterfinals of the 16th World Championships. The country had a final glimmer of hope in Muhd Hafiz B Hashim when he was taken to 3 sets by the unseeded Anup Shridhar.

Anup Arises Again

India’s Anup, who had already registered an enormous win over Taufik Hidayat, arose from the dead again to steal his 2nd major upset of the tournament. In both matches, Anup was silenced in the 2nd game but clearly resurrected in the 3rd and then he stormed away to a victory.

“Hafiz is ranked far higher than me and is more experienced than me, so I decided to not be bothered about my win yesterday and to focus on today. Though I think yesterday’s win was harder,” revealed Anup.

On his thoughts about the draft conditions, he said, “I’ve played in courts far worse than the conditions here, so it shouldn’t really be a hindrance”. This perhaps explained how Anup seemed to be the only player unaffected by the draft especially in his display against Hafiz, which concluded with scores of 21-19, 21-18, 15-21.

Malaysia’s Redemption

Very seldom do the Malaysian women players make up for their male compatriots but, Malaysia probably experienced a first today. Malaysia's 10th-seeded women single’s player Wong Mew Choo (pictured below) stood tall for Malaysia, as her opponent, 2nd seed Xie Xingfang, crumbled before an enthusiastic Malaysian crowd that had been waiting all night for something, or someone, worth cheering for.

It was a match where Wong did everything right and Xie had everything going wrong for her. Xie was evidently frustrated by how the draft was affecting her ability to control her shots and as the margin between her and Wong grew wider, she was visibly unable to tame her nerves.

And if lady luck exists, she was definitely not smiling at Xie. For instance, after an extremely long rally at 7-16 down, Xie managed to force Mew Choo into an awkward position and Mew Choo desperately returned a back hand drive that hit the tape of the net and toppled over on Xie’s side.

Mew Choo was swamped with questions at the post-match conference, but the soft-spoken Malaysian did her best to address everyone’s queries. She started off by describing her game plan for today. She revealed “My game plan just now was to push the shuttle to Xie’s backhand because I know her forehand is very strong. I kept giving overhead shots to her. Moreover, I also took advantage of the wind.

“I think Xie couldn’t really control her shots because of the wind, which caused her to be very tense, and she couldn’t play really well.

“I tried not to think about the fact that I was playing against the world No 1. I just focussed, by myself, on the game and just used all the tactics that I had prepared.

“And even though I beat Xie Xing Fang today, I really don't know what will happen tomorrow against Zhu Lin because generally it is very very hard to beat Chinese players.

Lin Dan To Take Xie For Retail Therapy

Xie’s boyfriend Lin Dan spoke on behalf of her girlfriend, saying “I comforted her by saying that this World Championship is still a good learning experience for her, despite the loss, and despite the fact that she is a two-time champion because I feel that this will be good for her preparation for the Olympics. It isn’t always good to keep winning. There is additional pressure when one keeps winning.

“As a player myself, I can totally understand how she is feeling and it's good to have support. In fact, there isn’t anything that needs to be said to her about what went wrong with her game et cetera.

“Understandably, she is feeling terrible now, like anyone would. But she might feel better after a good night’s rest. If it doesn’t work out that way, I’ll try to help her get over it as soon as possible rather than dwelling on the defeat because I feel it is not good for her to bring these negative emotions back to China with her.

“Which was why, the first thing I said to her just now was that I will still take her shopping when we get back to China."

Copyright © 2007 Badzine.