Malaysia’s unheralded women’s doubles pair Go Pei Kee-Teoh Mei Xing upset the form book at the China Open today when they defeated a top Japanese pair to qualify for the quarter-finals.
The world No 22 pair battled for more than an hour to overcome Rin Iwanaga-Kie Nakanishi 26-24, 7-21, 21-18 in a hard-fought three-game match in Changzhou.
This is a major achievement for the Malaysians as it will be their first quarter-final appearance at a World Tour Super 1000 event.
Today’s match was the first time both pairs had met in an international tournament.
The Malaysians face another tough encounter in tomorrow’s quarter-final, meeting home pair Jia Yi Fan-Zhang Shu Xian, who are ranked world No 8.
The tournament offers a total prize money of US$2 million (RM8.4 million), with winners in the doubles events taking home US$148,000 (RM624,000) and the runners-up US$70,000 (RM295,146).
All semi-finalists will get US$28,000 (RM118,000) each while quarter-finalists will be awarded US$12,500 (RM52,700).
