KUALA LUMPUR: National para badminton men’s singles ace, Cheah Liek Hou clinched his eleventh title on the trot after winning the 4 Nations Para Badminton International 2022 in Dublin, Ireland, yesterday.
Top seed Liek Hou, who played in the SU5 (physical impairment) category, was truly in sensational form as he took only 39 minutes to subdue Japanese second seed shuttler, Taiyo Imai, 21-17, 21-16, in the final.
Not only that, the reigning Paralympic champion also bagged his second title in the tournament, this time with his partner, Muhamad Faris Ahmad Azri, after topping the group in the men’s doubles event.
In the first match, Muhamad Faris-Liek Hou outplayed Gullaume Gailly-Mathieu Thomas of France, 21-9, 21-10 followed by a second win over Nilesh Balu Gaiwad-Manoj Sarkar of India, 21-6, 21-16.
Muhamad Faris-Liek Hou then confirmed the title after they edged their closest rivals, Chirag Baretha-Hardik Makkar, also from India, 21-19, 21-17.
Despite winning another title in Ireland, the world number one player admitted that he did not want to get carried away with his feat there as he had already set his sights on ‘rocking’ the 11th ASEAN Para Games (APG) in Solo (Surakarta), Indonesia from July 30 to Aug 6.
“I will fly to Solo on July 26, I feel that meet (the APG) will be a big challenge because Indonesia’s Dheva Anrimusthi whom I was up against in the Tokyo Paralympics final last year will also be competing.
“As they are the hosts it will be a challenge for me to win in their country and I also hope there will be no injuries before we (team) go to and when we are in Indonesia,” he told Bernama when contacted today.
In Tokyo, Liek Hou defeated his arch-rival Dheva 21-17, 21-15, and thus created history when he became the first player ever to win the Paralympic gold in the men’s singles SU5 category as badminton made its debut at the Tokyo Paralympics.
Meanwhile, national wheelchair para badminton ace Muhammad Ikhwan Ramli and his partner, Noor Azwan Noorlan came out tops against Rick Cornell Hellmann-Thomas Wandschneider of Germany, winning in 20-22, 21-17, 21-11, to be crowned as the men’s doubles WH1-WH2 (physical impairment) champions.
Earlier, Muhammad Ikhwan failed to win the men’s singles WH1 event after he went down to Hiroshi Murayama of Japan 10-21, 14-21. — Bernama
