ANN/THE STAR – After a hard-fought journey to the semi-finals, Malaysia’s women’s doubles badminton pair, Pearly Tan and M. Thinaah, faced an uphill battle in the bronze medal match. Their valiant effort in the Paris Olympics concluded with a tough loss to Japan’s top-ranked duo, Nami Matsuyama and Chiharu Shida, at the Adidas Arena in Port de la Chapelle yesterday.
The Malaysian pair, ranked 12th in the world, who had captivated many with their historic semi-final performance, struggled to find their best form in the final match. They were defeated 11-21, 11-21 in just 41 minutes.
Matsuyama-Shida were the favourites, having beaten the Malaysians nine times in their past 10 meetings and proved their superiority in the match with their strong defence and dangerous attacks.
Pearly and Thinaah were both in tears after the defeat.
“From the start, our opponents pressured us a lot and made it tough for us,” lamented Pearly.
“We tried everything to overcome them point by point but we could not. This defeat really hurts. We are heartbroken.
“We did not want to give up until the end but they played well. Congratulations to them.”
Thinaah said: “We want to apologise to all Malaysians. We could not win the bronze. We are disappointed but we are proud of ourselves. Reaching the semi-finals is a big achievement.”
Indeed it was. Expectations had not been high on them, especially after they were placed in the toughest group in the competition along with China’s world No 1 Chen Qingchen-Jia Yifan, Japan’s former two-time world champions Mayu Matsumoto-Wakana Nagahara and Indonesia’s world No 9 Apriyani Rahayu-Siti Fadia Ramadhanti.
Still, they managed to make it out of the group beating the Japanese and Indonesian before creating history by becoming the first Malaysians to reach the women’s doubles semi-finals with an impressive win over South Korea’s 2021 Tokyo Games bronze medallists Kim So-yeong-Kong Hee Yong.
Pearly-Thinaah also gave Qingchen-Yifan a huge scare before going down fighting 12-21, 21-18, 15-21 in the semi-finals.
