Chong Wei marches into final of Indonesia Open

Malaysian veteran shuttler Lee Chong Wei marched into the men's singles final of the Indonesia Open Superseries after dampening Indonesia's only hope in the championship, Ihsan Maulana Mustofa, in an easy two straight games here on Saturday.

The five-time champion of Indonesia Open thrashed the non-seeded Mustofa 21-9, 21-18 in 39 minutes amid the strong support of the home audience for the local hope in the landmark badminton stadium of Istora Senayan, reports Xinhua.

The former world No.1 and two-time Olympic silver medallist will play the final against Denmark's Jan Jornensen, who won through a hard fought victory against China's Tian Houwei in the other semi-final 21-14, 18-21, 21-17.

Chong Wei has a 15-1 advantage in career meetings against world No.5 Jorgensen. The Danish shuttler's only win came in 2009 at the China Open.

"It doesn't matter whom I would meet in the final, the most important thing is to keep me fit and focus for the match," said Chong Wei, who plays as second seed in the tournament, at a court side press briefing.

As for the women's singles final, China's Yihan Wang will face Chinese Taipei's dark horse Tai Tzu Ying, who surprisingly beat sixth seeded Shixian Wang of China 21-9, 21-15 in two straight games in 34 minutes.

Fourth seed Yihan beat two-time reigning world champion and top seed Carolina Marin of Spain 16-21, 21-11, 21-17 in an hour and 18 minutes.

Coming into the final, Tai leads 4-3 against former world champion Yihan in a head-to-head record.

There are also hopes for China to win the women's doubles and mixed doubles as Tang Yuanting/Yu Yang will vie against Japanese Misaki Matsutomo/Ayaka Takahashi in the women's doubles final and Xu Chen/Ma Jin fight for the mixed doubles title against South Korea's Ko Sung Yun/Kim Ha Na, who toppled Chinese top-seeded pair Zhang Nan/Zhao Yunlei in the semi-final.

--IANS

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