WORLD JUNIORS 2012 – Lee and Shin become first junior pair to repeat

Koreans Lee So Hee and Shin Seung Chan defended their World Junior Championship girls’ doubles title while Alfian Eko Prasetya had to settle for silver in mixed. The Japanese pair of Takuto Inoue/Yuki Kaneko fought for a win in front of their home crowd, but were bested by Lee Chun Hei / Ng Ka Long of Hong Kong.

By Hitoshi Yoshiki, Badzine Correspondent live in Chiba.  Photos: Miyuki Komiya for Badzine (live)

In the girls’ doubles, Lee So Hee / Shin Seung Chan, the defending 2011 World Junior and recent 2012 Asia Junior Champions, attested that they deserved the honours, the Koreans taking the first game easily, 21-14.

However, the way to victory was much harder as in the second game China’s Yu Xiaohan / Huang Yaqiong, also runners-up to the Koreans at the Asia Juniors, showed their good offensive technique. The Koreans were left trailing from 2-2, the Chinese pair closing the game out 21-18.

The beginning of the deciding game was much closer with many tense rallies. It was the Koreans who finally broke the equilibrium with the score level at 10-10, pushing the lead to 17-11 before taking this deciding game 21-18.

“I believed in my partner firmly,” Shin said after the match. “We kept attacking. That’s why we were able to win.”

Lee added, “Well, it’s the fruit of our daily effort. We’re happy to win the match now.”

While three other players – Ow Yao Han, Xie Jing, and the great Yu Yang – have won doubles titles with different partners in consecutive World Junior Championship tournaments, Lee and Shin are the first in the history of the event to repeat as a pair.  They are wasting no time in trying to make the transition to the senior game and will be traversing hemispheres to take part in the Iceland and Norwegian Internationals starting next week.

The mixed doubles match saw an all-Indonesian battle, with Edi Subaktiar / Melati Daeva Oktaviani playing defending champion Alfian Eko Prasetya and new partner Shella Devi Aulia in a one-sided affair, Edi and Melati winning 21-17, 21-13 in only 29 minutes to take the trophy.

Edi commented on the match, “It’s the first time we faced them. Frankly speaking, they seemed so tired. Our pairing has been running for two years now, you know, we hope we can win the next domestic junior tournament, too.”

In boys’ doubles, Takuto Inoue / Yuki Kaneko got through to the final in their home tournament, but strong opposition in the form of Lee Chun Hei / Ng Ka Long of Hong Kong saw them lose in another quick game, lasting only 28 minutes.

“We couldn’t do anything we needed to do to win the match,” Takuto told the press. “They were able to intercept even our good shots.”

In contrast, Ng said, “We thought they were as strong as us, but we researched their playing a lot. It was not difficult to win the match, in fact.”

“We’ve prepared steadfastly together,” the head coach of Hong Kong-China team told Badzine. “Our tactics were pretty effective. It’s the main cause of this sweeping win.”

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