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South Korea's Seo Seung-jae (L) shakes hands with Chae Yu-jung in the mixed doubles badminton quarter-final match against Hong Kong during the Paris 2024 Olympic Games at Porte de la Chapelle Arena in Paris on Wednesday. (AFP-Yonhap) |
PARIS -- South Korea has secured at least the silver medal in the mixed doubles event in badminton at the Paris Olympics, after an all-Korean semifinal duel as set up on Wednesday.
Seo Seung-jae and Chae Yu-jung first advanced to the semifinals by defeating Tang Chun Man and Tse Ying Suet of Hong Kong 2-0 (21-15, 21-10) in the quarterfinals at La Chapelle Arena in Paris.
Moments later, Kim Won-ho and Jeong Na-eun also reached the semifinals with a 2-0 (21-19, 21-14) win over Chen Tang Jie and Toe Ee Wei of Malaysia.
This ensured that South Korea will have a team in the final and win its first mixed doubles medal since Lee Yong-dae and Lee Hyo-jung won gold at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
Seo and Chae are the 2023 world mixed doubles champions and are No. 2 in the Badminton World Federation (BWF) rankings. Kim and Jeong are No. 8 in the same rankings.
Seo and Chae have so far won all five meetings against Kim and Jeong, most recently during the BWF World Tour Finals in December 2023.
After his team's match ended but before Kim and Jeong won theirs, Seo said it would be "an honor" to play the fellow South Korean team in the semifinals.
"Hopefully, we will both do our best," Seo said. "We'll be watching their match now and cheering on them as well."
Seo's wish came true later in the evening.
"I am so happy that both of our teams made the semifinals at the Olympics," Kim said. "But it's going to be cutthroat out there. We'll do our best until the end."
Jeong said she feels so close to the gold medal that she could almost taste it.
"I don't want to have regrets at the end," she said. "I want to give this my best shot."
Earlier Wednesday, An Se-young, world No. 1 in the women's singles, cruised into the quarterfinals after beating Qi Xuefei of France 2-0 (21-5, 21-7) in her final Group A match.
By winning Group A with two straight wins, An advanced directly to the quarterfinals on Saturday.
In the quarters, An will face the winner of the round of 16 match between Akane Yamaguchi of Japan and Supanida Katethong of Thailand.
Another South Korean player, Kim Ga-eun, advanced to the round of 16 by defeating Goh Jin Wei of Malaysia 2-1 (21-17, 20-22, 23-21) to clinch the top spot in Group H.
She will next face the Group G winner, Gregoria Mariska Tunjung of Indonesia, in the round of 16 on Thursday.
