KUALA LUMPUR: National number one women’s doubles pair, Pearly Tan-M. Thinaah, may have found their rhythm too late in the recently-concluded World Tour Finals (WTF) 2024 in Hangzhou Olympic Sports Centre Gymnasiumbut they are determined to carry the positive momentum into the 2025 season.
Despite losing all Group A matches in the 2024 World Tour Finals (WTF), their final tournament of the year, Pearly singled out their last match against the world number one duo Liu Sheng Shu-Tan Ning, as a key moment to build on, hoping to carry that energy into the Malaysia Open 2025 next month.
Pearly-Thinaah fought hard before going down 9-21, 21-18, 18-21, to the home pair in the season finale held at the Hangzhou Olympic Sports Centre Gymnasium.
“We are still positive although we could not advance from the group but we were able to find our gameplay in the last match and we hope to maintain that momentum for the Malaysia Open 2025.
“Since we are playing at home, we hope to play at our best. No matter win or lose we just want to have a good show for the audience to enjoy,” she told reporters after a training session, here yesterday.
Pearly-Thinaah opened their third WTF campaign on the wrong foot, losing to Japan’s top pair Nami Matsuyama-Chiharu Shida 21-13, 17-21, 18-21 and suffered another defeat to India’s Treesa Jolly-Gayatri Gopichand Pullela 19-21, 19-21.
Pearly also hoped to stay fit and healthy as well as improve their gameplay to weather the new challenges next season.
Meanwhile, Thinaah picked their fine run in their first Olympic Games in Paris 2024 as well as winning the Hong Kong Open as the main highlights for the 2024 season.
Pearly-Thinaah made history by becoming Malaysia’s first women’s doubles pair to reach the semi-finals at the Olympics.
However, they missed out of a chance to reach the finals when they fell to China’s Chen Qing Chen-Jia Yi Fan, 12-21, 21-18, 15-21.
They ended their commendable debut at the Olympic Games in fourth place as they came up short against Matsuyama-Shida, 11-21, 11-21.
The world number six pair clinched their only title by clinching the Hong Kong Open 2024 as they stunned Sheng Shu-Tan Ning 21-14, 21-14 as well as secured two runner-up spots this year, namely Korea Open 2024 and Arctic Open 2024. – BERNAMA
