Badminton player An Se-young wins China Masters ahead of Asian Games
In Shenzhen, China, world No. 1 in women’s singles An Se-young defeated Japan’s Tomoka Miyazaki in the China Masters final. The South Korean representative won the match 21:17, 21:6, Korea Herald reports.
Third consecutive title
An Se-young needed 45 minutes to beat world No. 9 Miyazaki. Over five matches at the tournament, she did not lose a single game to her opponents and claimed her third consecutive China Masters title.
In August, An Se-young won the second world champion title of her career. The China Masters was her final tournament before the Asian Games, which will be held in Japan’s Aichi Prefecture.
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Final match
In the first game, Miyazaki put up resistance at the start and did not trail by more than two points until the score was 13:10. After that, An Se-young won two consecutive rallies following unsuccessful shuttlecock returns by her Japanese opponent. Miyazaki cut the deficit to 18:15, but the Korean badminton player closed out the game 21:17, winning the final point with a smash that her opponent could not return.
An Se-young began the second game by scoring eight consecutive points. After Miyazaki’s first point at 8:1, the Korean again won three rallies in a row and finished the match with a 6:1 run. An Se-young now leads her head-to-head record against Miyazaki 8:0.
Asian Games
The women’s team tournament at the Asian Games begins on September 20, and South Korea’s national team will seek to defend its gold medal. The women’s singles tournament starts on September 25, with the final scheduled for September 29. An Se-young is considered the favorite for a second consecutive gold medal, although no Korean male or female badminton player has yet won Asian Games gold medals twice in a row.
