Nitchaon Jindapol and Khosit Phetpradab moved into the semi-finals of the Korea Masters 2017 in Gwangju yesterday.
Second seed Nitchaon cruised past Taiwan's Lee Chia-hsin 21-18, 21-8 while No.7 seed Khosit also had an easy workout against Thai compatriot Kantaphon Wangcharoen, winning their encounter 21-11, 21-7 at the US$120,000 (approximately 3.9 million baht) of the BWF Grand Prix Gold tournament at Yeomju Gymnasium.
Nitchaon, who won the Bitburger Open in Germany last month, faces fifth seed Lee Jang-Mi of South Korea for a place in tomorrow's women's singles final while Khosit plays another home player, No.4 seed Jeon Hyeok-Jin, for a shot at the men's crown.
Jeon defeated French fifth seed Brice Leverdez 21-9, 21-12 in yesterday's quarters.
Eighth seed Pornpawee Chochuwong failed to make it through after losing to fellow 19-year-old Gao Fangjie of China 17-21, 21-13, 16-21 in the women's singles quarter-finals.
The 62-ranked Gao, a runner-up to Japan's Akane Yamaguchi at the China Open Superseries Premier tournament a couple of weeks ago, took the tie in just under an hour and will play compatriot Wang Zhiyi in the last four today.
Wang, 17, stunned top seed Sung Ji-Hyun of South Korea 27-25, 7-21, 21-12 to advance.
In the men's doubles action, fifth seeds Bodin Isara and Nipitphon Phuangphuapet bowed out to unseeded South Koreans Jung Jae-Wook and Kim Gi-Jung in a three-game thriller.
The fifth seeds took the opening game 21-16 but Jung and Kim, backed by the vocal home crowd, mounted a spirited comeback to take the second and third games 21-19 and 24-22.
SOLE THAI IN DUBAI
Ratchanok Intanon will be the only Thai player at the BWF Dubai World Superseries Finals 2017.
The US$1 million (33 million baht) season finale will be held at Hamdan Sports Complex between Dec 13-17.
World No.6 Ratchanok will join the elite field of the top eight female players from the Destination Dubai Rankings.
Others in the line-up include Japan's Akane Yamaguchi, Taiwan's Tai Tzu-ying, South Korea's Sung Ji-Hyun, India's PV Sindhu, Spain's Carolina Marin, China's He Bingjiao and Japan's Nozomi Okuhara.
The men's field will feature South Korea's Son Wan-Ho, India's Srikanth Kidambi, China's Shi Yuqi, Malaysia's Lee Chong Wei, Taiwan's Chou Tien-chen, Hong Hong's Angus Ng Ka Long, China's Chen Long and Denmark's Viktor Axelsen.
Current top-ranked players Tai and Axelsen won the women's and men's singles titles last year.
