Soft tennis mixed doubles 18th Asian Games Jakarta Palembang 2018

18th  Asian Games Jakarta

Palembang 2018

Chinese Taipei Win gold In Soft tennis mixed

 doubles

In

Asian Games 2018

Antara/Palembang/ Jakarta

Chinese Taipei pair Yu Kaiwen and Cheng Chuling won the mixed doubles gold medal in the 2018 Asian Games soft tennis competition after defeating Korea (KOR) pair Kim Kisung and Mun Hyegyeong 5-3 in the final match at the Jakabaring tennis court on Thursday.

In the first set, Yu Kaiwen and Cheng Chuling won 4-1, but the Korean pair turned things around in the second set and won 4-1.

In the third set, Kaiwen had a problem with his left foot and received treatment at the end of the set. Chinese Taipei lost the third set 2-4.

Kaiwen and Cheng, however, won the next two sets 4-0 and 4-2, thus leading 3-2 as of the fifth set.

However, Kisung and Hyegyeong equalized after winning 4-2 in the sixth set.

Yet Mun Hyegyeong suffered a recurrence of the injury she suffered earlier this year to her left knee when the match was in the seventh set, postponing play while the player was treated.

Hyegyeong had to continue in the next two sets, with the Koreans losing the seventh and eighth sets 2-4 and 0-4.

"We tried our best at every opportunity during the match and applied what we had got during the training sessions ahead of the Asian Games," Kaiwen said.

"This is very special for us as we’ve never thought of winning gold here. To be honest, this is a surprise to us because this is our first appearance in the Asian Games as a pair and we are happy about it," Cheng said.

"We were not under pressure, we only played to the fullest and as natural as possible. We did not want to force ourselves although we knew the Korean pair in the semifinals were the defending champions," Kaiwen said.

As for Kim Kisung and Hyegyeong Mun, the result was disappointing because Hyegyeong had to play with an injury.

"I could feel the injury that I got in January during the match, but it should not have been a problem. We do feel happy to win the silver medal although we were a bit disappointed. I'm also happy because in our first Asian Games appearance, we won silver," Hyegyeong said.

Indonesia failed to win medals in the mixed doubles after the pairs Dede Tari Kusrini - Irfandi Hendrawan and Voni Darlina - Hemat Bakti Anugerah were eliminated in the preliminaries on Wednesday (Aug. 29).