Malaysian girls got gold medal

Malaysian women celebrated a rare success at the international arena when the pair of Vivian Kah and Woon Khe Wee won the Doubles title at the Bankaltim Indonesian Open Gold Grand Prix last weekend.
In an intensely absorbing match, the Malaysian youngsters prevailed in a come-from-behind19-21, 21-19, 21-18 victory over the higher placed Bao Yixin & Zhong Gianzin of China. The Chinese girls had only a week earlier won the more prestigious Japan leg of the Super Series. The Chinese pair is ranked 48 by Badminton World Federation while Vivian & Woo are at 60.
The success of the youngsters who are both in their early twenties, obviously must have brought the smiles to the faces of the people who manage the sport in Malaysia where women badminton has never scored any major success along the international arena.   The second Malaysian pairing of Chin Eei Hui & Wong Pei Tty, who at one stage were top ranked by BWF have in recent times faded off through injury and are ranked at 23.
Vivian & Woon play a pretty good brand of the game and have been consistently improving. With proper guidance and continued exposure, there is every likelihood of a promising playing career for the duo.
But it was not all lost for the Chinese girls when Bao Yixin later teamed up with He Habin to clinch the gold in the Mixed Doubles.
The shock of the tournament must really be the elimination of the pre-tournament favourite, the enduring warrior Taufik Hidayat in the semi-finals. He lost out quite tamely 21-10, 21-15 to young Tommy Sugiarto, son of the 1983 World Champion Icuk.
Taufik has been having a relatively ’quiet’ season since his success at the 2004 Olympics and 2005 World Championships. Obviously age is gradually taking its toll on one of the game’s most colourful and popular players.

For the young Tommy, the win against Taufik only brought him momentary joy, for 24 hours later, his teammate Rumbaka Hayam, ranked eight rungs below at 27, finished stronger with an exciting 21-15, 21-16 win in the final.
The French veteran and seasoned campaigner Pi Hongyan, who was seeking her first Grand Prix win of the year failed against her younger Chinese opponent Chen Xiao Jia in the final. In a match that went all the way to the ‘rubber’, a visibly tiring Hongyan had to finally hand the gold medal to Xiao Jia who will go on record as one of the lowest ranked players to win a Gold event. The Chinese is presently at 113 against Hongyan 19th ranking.