All England Open badminton 2023: Loh Kean Yew suffers first-round exit
The 2021 men's world champion loses in three games to Chinese shuttler Zhao Junpeng, while Indonesia's Anthony Sinisuka Ginting makes it through. Women's Olympic champ Chen Yufei progresses to the second round.
Badminton
Loh Kean Yew became the first major casualty of badminton's 2023 All England Open on Tuesday (14 March) as the men's eighth seed crashed out against Zhao Junpeng.
Singapore's Loh, the 2021 world champion, was staring down the barrel of a straight-games defeat to his opponent from the People's Republic of China, but fought hard to send the match to a deciding game.
From 6–11 down in the second, Loh took 15 of the next 20 points to force the decider, but was unable to keep his challenge going.
Zhao took the first six points in the third game to leave Loh in his wake, ultimately triumphing 21–16, 16–21, 21–7 as Loh could provide no answer.
Meanwhile, third seed Anthony Sinisuka Ginting of Indonesia secured his ticket through to the last 16.
Ginting needed 51 minutes to hold off a dogged Kantaphon Wangcharoen of Thailand 21–17, 21–19.
That sees him through to face India's H.S. Prannoy in the second round.
Earlier in the women's draw, Olympic champion Chen Yufei was tested by Canada's Michelle Li, but eventually held on for a straight-games win.
Chen was unable to pull clear of Li in the opening game, eventually taking it 22–20, before finally finding the breathing room she had been looking for in the second.
The fourth seed took 49 minutes to register a 22–20, 21–14 victory over Li.