PARIS: Top national women’s pair Pearly Tan-M. Thinaah keep their quarter-final hopes alive by scoring an upset win over world number six Mayu Matsumoto-Wakana Nagahara of Japan in the 2024 Olympic Games badminton competition this morning.
The world number 13 ranked Malaysians gave a spirited display to beat the 2018 and 2019 world champions 18-21, 21-15, 21-16 in the Group A match at Porte De La Chapelle Arena.
Pearly-Thinaah led 11-7 in the opening game but faltered to let the Japanese win 21-18.
Spurred by the support of the 8,000-strong crowd, Pearly-Thinaah played more aggressively to lead early in the second game before romping to a 21-15 win to force a rubber game.
In the decider, Pearly-Thinaah continued to rattle the Japanese with powerful attacks and clinch victory, stretching the head-to-head record to 4-2 in favour of the Malaysians.
In their Paris 2024 opening match yesterday, the Malaysians went down fighting 17-21, 20-22 in 55 minutes to world number one Chen Qing Chen-Jia Yi Fan of China.
Pearly-Thinaah need to beat Apriyani Rahayu-Siti Fadia Silva Ramadhanti of Indonesia in their final group match on Tuesday to qualify for the quarter-finals.
Speaking to Bernama after the victory, the pair hoped to rectify their mistakes in the last group match.
“It was a great game, really felt happy. But there’s still room for improvement because we still have one more match, so we want to focus on that and give our 100 per cent,” said Thinaah.
Pearly said they almost paid the price for their eagerness to score points.
However, they played a more patient game after national coaching director Rexy Mainaky and women’s doubles head coach Hoon Thien How pointed out their flaw.
“The most important factor for our win is we helped each other. Our coaches also kept reminding us to stay patient and calm. We were too eager to kill the shots, which made things worse.
“By being more patient and calm, we really could get points. For our next game, we just want to stay focused for every point and enjoy the match as usual,” she added.
Meanwhile, Apriyani-Siti Fadia suffered their second straight defeat, meaning their campaign will end at the group stage.
After losing to Matsumoto-Nagahara in their opening match yesterday, the Indonesians found Qing Chen-Yi Fan too strong today, losing 12-21, 22-24 for the Chinese pair to book their quarter-final berth.
