PETALING JAYA: Men’s doubles shuttler Aaron Chia is excited to get his scratch partnership with Aaron Tai started at the China Open this week after the youngster’s valiant outing in Japan recently.
Aaron Tai and his regular partner Kang Khai Xing had made it to the quarter-finals of the Super 750 Japan Open on Friday before their campaign ended at the hands of top seed South Korea’s Kim Won-ho-Seo Seung-jae.
Aaron said his namesake has been performing well and their new partnership could spring some surprises.
“I see Aaron Tai as a very talented player. That’s my opinion based on how I see him play,” said Aaron Chia.
“It will definitely be interesting when we compete together.”
Aaron-Khai Xing had earlier downed seventh seeded Chinese pair Chen Boyang-Liu Yi in the opening round, before defeating Taiwan’s Lee Jhe-huei-Yang Po-hsuan in the second.
Aaron said that he and his new partner had trained together before the latter departed for Japan, and added that their opening round tie in China will not be easy as they take on world No. 4 Indian duo Satwiksairaj Rankireddy-Chirag Shetty.
But Aaron stressed that the scratch pair are in a testing phase and are not putting too much pressure on themselves.
“It doesn’t really matter who we face, but preparation will be the most important thing,’’ he added.
“We don’t really know what will happen until we try it.
“Who knows, maybe having multiple scratch pairs could be stronger?
“But we can’t say for now.
“We have to let things happen and see how they go.”
Both Aarons will be teamed up for the China Open, Taiwan Open (July 28-Aug 2), and the Korean Masters (Aug 4-9).
Veteran Aaron will then partner Tee Kai Wun for the European leg of the World Tour from October.
