So long Taufik, Hashim, says Chen (July 19, 2007)

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While his potential fancied rivals fell by the wayside
in shocking fashions, top seed and world No. 2 Chen
Hong continued to live up to his reputation as he
fashioned out a third straight set victory to advance
to the quarterfinal round of the men’s singles in the
2007 Bingo Bonanza Philippine Open Badminton
Championships Thursday.

Flicking away tough forehand shots and displaying
superb court coverage before a sizeable crowd at the
Philsports Arena in Pasig City, Metro Manila, the
28-year-old Chen dominated Malaysian Kwong Beng Chan,
21-17, 21-11, to emerge the first player in the
quarterfinal round of the $120,000 event put up by
Bingo Bonanza Corp. for the second straight year.
“It feels good to win, I’m playing okay,” said the
30-year-old Fujian native through an interpreter.
Chen, a two-time winner of the All-England and China Open,
said it’s unfortunate that Indon ace Taufik
Hidayat and Malaysian Hafiz Hashim lost their games
but life goes on.

“I was looking forward to playing with them but they
lost,” Chen said. “But it makes no difference since
the tournament will continue even without them.”
Hidayat, the reigning Olympic and Asian Games champion
tipped to engage Chen in the quarters, was ambushed by
60th ranked Tien Minh Nguyen of Vietnam, 21-18, 21-13,
while Hazim, who beat brother Roslin to win the crown
in last year’s inaugurals of the tournament, a Grand
Prix Gold event organized by IMG, was shown the exit
door by Russian, 21-13, 21-23, 13-21.

In women’s play, No. 3 Yip Pui Yin of Hong Kong
trounced Xing Aiying of Singapore , 21-11, 21-17, to
remain the highest seeded player in her division after
top seed Eriko Hirose of Japan and second pick Tine
Rasmussen of Denmark bowed out.

Hirose was ahead, 21-9, 10-4 against Anna Rice of
Canada when she sustained an injury and was forced to
retire while Rasmussen was eliminated in the first
round.