China's Super Dan to fight for sixth world title against Axelsen
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E-mail Xinhua, August 27, 2017
China's Lin Dan will fight for his sixth world title against Denmark's third seed Victor Axelsen as the twice Olympic champion beat top-seeded Son Wan Ho of South Korea to reach the final of the World Badminton Championships on Saturday.
Lin, who previously won the world title in 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011 and 2013, scored a hard fought-victory of 21-17, 21-14 in 59 minutes.
Nicknamed Super Dan by his fans, the 33-year-old will play his seventh final in the World Championships. He lost only once in 2005.
"It seems that everyone is talking about my age, but seldom can you see my hard work," he said after the match. "I am very happy to keep practicing every day and to keep such a high level."
He added, "Badminton is very complicated, especially in men's singles. There are so many strong players and powerful opponents and a lot of x-factors in all of the matches. So if one player wants to go further until the finals he has to work harder than ever before. So I am very happy I managed to do this."
Lin, who also won the Olympic gold medals in 2008 and 2012, will take on Olympic bronze medalist Axelsen in Sunday's final. The 23-year-old Dane crushed twice defending champion Chen Long 21-9, 21-10 in the day's first match.
"Today I watched Victor against Chen Long," Lin said. "I think he is playing very well and is in very good condition, throughout the whole week. Tomorrow will be my last game at this World Championships and I want to play at 100%."
Axelsen, 2014 world bronze medalist, said his dream came true entering the final.
"I am still a little out of words," he said. "I am very happy. I made little mistakes today and made very few errors. It was nice to get revenge from the Olympic semifinals, I am very proud of myself.
"My coach and I always look back at past championships to get better and improve on my game. Denmark is a small country but I am very proud that we can compete with the bigger countries. It's a dream come true, ever since I was a little boy I dreamed of a World Championships final."
China's wait for a new women's world champion will continue as their only semifinalist Chen Yufei was stopped by India's fourth seed V. Sinduhu Pusarla 21-13, 21-10.
The world's most populous country has not produced a women's singles champion since Wang Yihan was crowned in 2011. Pusarla will next face Japan's Nozomi Okuhara, who defeated another Indian Saina Nehwal, last year's silver medalist, 12-21, 21-17, 21-10.
China's Chen Qingchen could be the only player to win two gold medals as she has reached both women's and mixed doubles finals.
She first paired with Jia Yifan to beat Japanese duo Misaki Matsutomo and Ayaka Takahashi 21-13, 25-27, 21-19 in the women's doubles and then booked a mixed doubles final berth with Zheng Siwei with a victory of 21-15, 23-21 over English couple Chris and Gabrielle Adcock.
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