Indonesia shocks Denmark to face Korea in semis

JAKARTA (JP): Third ranked Indonesia shocked the 1999 runner- up Denmark 3-2 in the Sudirman Cup mixed-team championship round- robin match in Seville, Spain on Wednesday.

Indonesia, which now tops Group B, will face dark horse South Korea in Friday's semifinals while Denmark will challenge defending champion China, which is aiming to bring home the trophy for the fourth time. Mighty China whitewashed Korea 5-0.

Bambang Suprianto and Minarti Timur opened Indonesia's victory by defeating the world number one pairing of Michael Sogaard and Rikke Olsen 15-11, 15-7.

World number 15 Hendrawan had to struggle to eliminate world number eight Anders Boesen, who was replacing world number two Peter Gade Christensen, 9-15, 15-2, 15-13.

Danish world number 16 Mette Sorensen, a substitute for world number one Camilla Martin, was much too powerful for Yuli Marfuah, ranked 49th, to narrow the gap 2-1 by winning 9-11, 13- 10, 11-6.

The new partnership of Sigit Budiarto and Flandy Limpele in the men's doubles ensured Indonesia's victory after giving their all to crush the world number one pairing of Jens Eriksen and Jesper Larsen 10-15, 15-8, 15-3.

In the indecisive women's doubles, Denmark was still trailing 3-2 after Ann-Lou Jorgensen and Mette Schjoldager easily beat Indarti Issoliana and Deyana Lomban 15-3, 15-6.

Indonesian head coach Christian Hadinata told The Jakarta Post on the sidelines of a training session in Seville on Thursday that he was also surprised by the victory. However, he underlined the poor form of Deyana and Indarti.

"Our women's doubles have yet to recover from their fatigue after playing in a tough match against England on Tuesday. We are having a break today and I'll listen to the coach's analysis before deciding the line-up for Friday's semifinals.

"I'm quite satisfied with the men's doubles as it's their first performance. Sigit and Flandy seemed unable to cope with the pressure in the first game but they managed to deal with it and won.

"As for Hendrawan, he showed great form facing Boesen, who is much younger and faster. His experience really helped him.

Christian rejected the possibility that Denmark intentionally lost to Indonesia.

"I don't think they wanted to lose to our team. I am sure that Denmark wanted to top the group standings to avoid meeting China in the semifinals.

"The key to our success is our mixed doubles. Bambang and Minarti followed coach Richard Mainaky's instruction to hem Sogaard and Olsen in. I saw that Olsen was quite down in the dumps during the match yesterday.

In Group A, China crushed Korea 5-0. Chinese mixed duo Liu Yong and Gao Ling sweated it out to overpower Kim Dong-moon and Ra Kyung-min of Korea 8-15, 17-14, 15-4. Women's singles Zhou Mi overcame Jun Jae-youn 11-5, 13-10 while men's singles Chen Hong outclassed Shon Seung-mo 15-8, 15-6.

Men's doubles Zhang Jun and Zhang Wei beat Ha Tae-kwon and Yoo Yong-sung 15-5, 15-13 while women's doubles Huang Nanyan and Yang Wei eliminated Lee Kyung-won and Ra Kyung-min 11-15, 15-10, 15-8.

Tight-lipped

Christian remained tight-lipped on the Indonesian team line-up against Korea for Friday's semis.

"We'll submit the line-up today at 6.00 p.m. local time (11.00 p.m. Jakarta time) as we're set to play tomorrow's first semis at 12.00 p.m. local time.

"But I'm quite sure that Korea will field the same team because they don't have so many players.

Meanwhile, Chinese head coach Li Yongbo could not hide his disappointment with the semifinal match.

"We'd prefer to meet Indonesia rather than Denmark, who we think are stronger than Indonesia. We only enjoy the upper hand over the Danes in the women's doubles. As for the other four events, both sides have equal chances," Li was quoted as saying by Xinhua.

"But we are confident of winning a final berth. Our goal is to win the championship so we don't care who we come up against. We must defeat every opponent on our way to the championship."

On the contrary, Denmark head coach Kenneth Larsen said that he had arranged to meet China in the semifinals.

"If we wanted, we could have defeated Indonesia in the round- robin. But we didn't do that because we prefer to see China in the semifinals," Larsen was quoted as saying by Antara. (yan)