The wait for a first title on the World Tour continues in painstaking fashion for Aaron Chia-Soh Wooi Yik, who were no match for Liang Wei Keng-Wang Chang to lose 12-21, 14-21 in the China Open men’s doubles final.
This was the third final which Chia-Soh finished as runners-up, having lost to the same opponents at the India Open final before succumbing at the Indonesia Open finale to Satwiksairaj Rankireddy-Chirag Shetty in June.
The first game was over in just 10 minutes, as Chia-Soh fell behind no thanks to their jangling nerves that saw them falter many times through their opponents' flick serves.
It started off the same story in the second game with Chia-Soh continued to be error-strewn to gift Liang-Wang easy points as the Chinese pair surged into a six point advantage at the interval.
Sensing the game was slipping away from them only added to more nerves, with the world number six continuing to commit more unforced errors to confirm defeat after just 26 minutes.
It was a performance that was a far cry from their impressive win in the semi-finals, but more concerning is their big game mentality where they faltered in all three occasions this year.
Other results saw South Korea’s Seo Seung-jae-Chae Yu-jung add to their recent World Championships gold medal with the mixed doubles title after beating French pair Thom Gicquel-Delphine Delrue 21-19, 21-12.
Chen Qing Chen-Jia Yi Fan then lifted the crowd at the Olympic Sports Center Gymnasium with a dominant 21-11, 21-17 victory over South Korea’s Baek Ha-na-Lee So-hee to cement their dominance in the women’s doubles.
Women's singles ace An Se-young gave South Korea their second title of the day when the world number one outclassed Japan's Akane Yamaguchi 21-10, 21-19 to celebrate her ninth title of the season.
Viktor Axelsen then reigned supreme in the men’s singles when he defeated home shuttler Lu Guang Zu 21-16, 21-19 for his fifth title of the season.
