Taiwanese badminton star Tai Tzu-ying yesterday advanced to the second round of the Japan Open after beating Denmark’s Mia Blichfeldt 14-21, 21-15, 21-14.
Tai has reclaimed the world No. 1 ranking. In principle, Japan’s Akane Yamaguchi, who won the women’s singles titles at the BWF World Championships in Tokyo on Sunday, should have remained above Tai, who finished in joint third place.
Instead, Tai climbed one spot from second by holding on to her 110,845 ranking points, above Yamaguchi’s 109,413 points.
Photo: Badminton Photo
Due to COVID-19, the BWF froze its world rankings from March 31, 2020 to Feb. 2 last year, and has been including the players’ 10 best results for tournaments played as far back as 2019. The normal system — which the BWF is transitioning back to — only takes into account each player’s 10 best point totals over the past 52 weeks.
In other Japan Open matches, Taiwanese men’s doubles pair Lee Jhe-huei and Yang Po-hsuan beat China’s Liang Wei-keng and Wang Chang 21-19, 21-19.
Yang and his mixed doubles partner Hu Ling-fang did not fare as well, losing 22-20, 21-15 to Hong Kong’s Chang Tak-ching and Ng Wing-yung, while Wang Tzu-wei lost his men’s singles match 21-15, 21-15 to Japan’s Kanta Tsuneyama.
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