Of all national shuttlers, women’s doubles pair Chow Mei Kuan-Lee Meng Yean have been assigned the toughest draw of all after being placed in a group of death at the Tokyo Olympics.
Group A, which are they are housed in, contains world number one pair and top seeded Japanese Sayaka Hirota-Yuki Fukuhisma, Indonesia’s world number six Apriyani Rahayu-Greysia Polli and England’s top pair Chloe Birch-Lauren Smith.
But the Malaysians, one of the most improved pairings in the national team, are prepared to face anyone and confident of their chances against all three opponents.
“One key area is being ready for long matches. All the pairs at the Olympics are top players, so the rallies will be long and intense and matches will go on for over an hour. We need to have the staying power during these rallies.
“It’s crucial for us to be consistent too, and not be overly eager to try and kill off the seemingly easy shuttles. Every point will matter. Our preparations will be more towards studying videos of our opponents from now on,” said Lee.
Under women’s doubles chief Chan Chong Ming, who took over the team in July last year, Lee-Chow have steadily improved and now sit 11 on the world rankings.
Their ranking is testament to their impressive performance this year, where they qualified for three semi-finals at the Thailand Open 2, the 2020 World Tour Finals and Swiss Open.
Chan placed emphasis on their physical conditioning, drilling them towards longer endurance in matches, and separately, Lee also embarked on a fitness regime to build muscle and shed weight.
During the pair’s good run earlier this year, they beat Greysia-Apriyani in straight games at the World Tour Finals, to even the head-to-head record to 2-2 against the Indonesians.
“We have already beaten twice in the last two encounters, they will take note of that. Our training has been excellent so far, and we can see our improvement. It’s important that we do not put too much pressure on ourselves.
“If we perform to the best of our abilities, the results will follow through,” said Chow.
However, the Malaysians have yet to beat the other two pairs, losing six times against Yuki-Sayaka and suffering a narrow defeat to Chloe-Lauren at the Spain Masters quarter-finals last year.
