PETALING JAYA: Women’s doubles pair Low Zi Yu-Noraqilah Maisarah Ramdan bowed out early from the Malaysian Masters after going down to Bao Lijing-Cao Zihan of China on Wednesday (May 20).
The world No. 100 duo fell 18-21, 12-21 in 38 minutes to the world No. 144 Chinese pair at the Unifi Arena in Bukit Jalil.
Lijing-Zihan are coming off a hot run at the Thailand Open, where they captured the title in their international debut as partners by upsetting world No. 7 Rin Iwanaga-Kie Nakanishi of Japan.
Noraqilah admitted that the first game was tighter than the second.
They lost focus in the second game and trailed 0-11 before attempting to catch up.
"I think we were playing quite well in the first game – we really tried our best. But we let our guard down in the second.
"So when we were trailing by 11 points, we tried to catch up, but the gap was too big. They are a really good pair as well, and much more powerful than us," said Noraqilah.
The Malaysian pair entered the main draw of their maiden Malaysian Masters after receiving a bye in the qualifying rounds.
The youngsters missed out on the China Masters title last week, falling to Japan’s Sumire Nakade-Miyu Takahashi on Sunday (May 17).
