Liu Yu Chen and Ou Xuan Yi had the perfect wrap on a great first season together, as they achieved the biggest result of their partnership by winning the HSBC BWF World Tour Finals 2022.
The Chinese duo repeated their group stage win over Mohammad Ahsan/Hendra Setiawan, who fell off after a sensational comeback in the second game, 21-17 19-21 21-12.
The Indonesians looked down and out at 10-16 in the second, but Ou’s nervousness showed, and his errors helped Ahsan and Setiawan draw level. However, after 9-all in the third, the Chinese stamped their authority and went on to take their third title of the year.
“We’re very happy to win the championship, it was one of our goals. And we’re so thankful to the fans for always cheering for us,” said Liu Yu Chen.
“This is a good ending for us for the year, and puts us in a good frame of mind for 2023. Our hard work has been rewarded.”
Ou reflected on their missed opportunity to close the match in straight games.
“In the second game, we were leading but made many mistakes; we readjusted ourselves in time, and in the third we kept our focus to win.
“This is the first year of our partnership. We played better and better in the second half of the year. We still have a lot of room for improvement.”
The Indonesians, who fell to their fifth final defeat this year, gave credit to their opponents.
“We did our best, but our opponents played well today,” said Ahsan. “Today our performance against them was better than in the final group match, but the result was the same. We are happy that we got some good results this year.”