Mixed doubles stars Dechapol Puavaranukroh and Sapsiree Taerattanachai claimed their second successive group win which guaranteed them a place in the semi-finals of the BWF World Tour Finals 2019 in Guangzhou, China, on Thursday.
The Thai pair overcame Chan Peng Soon and Goh Liu Ying of Malaysia 21-16, 28-26 in an entertaining Group A clash at the US$1.5 million season-ending tournament at Tianhe Gymnasium last night.
It was the Thais' first win in five meetings against the Malaysians.
They will take on China's Wang Yilyu and Huang Dongping, who also have two wins, in the final group match today, with the victors taking the top spot.
Wang and Huang yesterday defeated South Korea's Seo Seung-Jae and Chae Yu-Jung 16-21, 21-12, 21-18.
In the women's singles event, Ratchanok Intanon fell to top-ranked Tai Tzu-ying of Taiwan in three games in their second Group B match.
Tai, champion in 2014 and 2016, needed to win to stay alive after losing her opener against Nozomi Okuhara on Wednesday and her victory over the Thai ace has now thrown their group into an interesting situation.
Tai was down 10-13 in the second game and struggled to find consistency, but once she edged through the second game, Ratchanok was the one under pressure against the sharpness and unpredictability of Tai's strokes, and the Taiwanese player broke through, 11-21, 21-18, 21-16.
Japan's Okuhara was in a strong position to progress after beating another Thai hope Busanan Ongbamrungphan 21-12, 21-10 for her second successive win in Group B.
Okuhara will play Ratchanok while Tai will face Busanan in the final group matches today.
Women's doubles players Jongkolphan Kititharakul and Rawinda Prajongjai lost their second straight match in Group B at the hands of Kim So-Yeong and Kong Hee-Yong of South Korea, 22-24, 12-21.
Kim and Kong, who won the most improved player of the year award, bounced back from their opening defeat to fellow Koreans Lee So-Hee and Shin Seung-Chan.
They will battle it out against world champions Mayu Matsumoto and Wakana Nagahara for a place in the last four after the Japanese pair were beaten by Lee and Shin in three games yesterday.
The semi-finalists from men's doubles Group B were decided, with Taiwan's Lee Yang and Wang Chi-Lin and Indonesia's Mohammad Ahsan and Hendra Setiawan completing their second wins. bangkok post/bwfworldtourfinals.com