China ensure maximum Olympic berths with two golds at Asian Badminton Championships

China grabbed two gold medals out of five on offer and ensured the maximum allocations for the Rio Olympics as the Asian Badminton Championships concluded here on Sunday.

The hosts won in women's singles and mixed doubles in the six-day tournament, which is also the last stop of the year-long Olympic qualifications.

"In each of all five disciplines, we have succeeded to get the maximum two berth for Olympics," said the chief coach Li Yongbo of China one day before the finals.

"And we are the sole team in the world to achieve this tough goal. I appreciate the players' efforts and attitudes a lot," added Li.

The final of the men's singles was the feature of the day. Malaysia's Lee Chong Wei, who defeated his arch rival Lin Dan 2-1 in semifinal, rallied to beat the other leading shuttler of the host Chen Long in 21-17, 15-21, 21-13.

"For me, the match lasted for three games as yesterday. Chen played well but at the critical time in the third game when we changed the court, I became more confident and scored quickly to win it," said Lee, the world number two.

It was Lee's fourth successive victory against Chen since the 2015 China Open. He thus took the lead in the duo's head to head record at 13-12.

However, Lee didn't look very excited after the victory because his main target is to win his first-ever gold medal in the Olympics this summer in Rio.

"For me, when I finished one match, my career was shortened by one match,"said Lee, who planned to play in his final Olympics after he was twice beaten by Lin Dan in the finals of the Beijing 2008 and London 2012 Games.

"The victory in Asian championships doesn't represent the outlook that I can win in Rio. At Olympics, there can be many upsets as every player has his own thought and mentality. There is no possibility for me to wait for another four years. So I have nothing to celebrate today," said Lee.

For Chen Long, who had played in his 18th match in the recent four weeks, said fatigue was one reason for his fourth defeat in a row against Lee.

"I feel the defeat was normal. It was our 25th meet in career and just like a soap opera," said Chen.

"I thought I can win in two games. The problem is in the first game when I controlled the momentum I failed to stay focused to win it. I was a little loose in mindset. However, the good news is that I can finally have a rest day tomorrow after the tight schedule in past four weeks."

The final of the women's singles is a national derby for the host. Wang Yihan, who hoped to grab more ranking points for the Olympic berth, upset her teammate and London Olympic winner Li Xuerui 21-14, 13-21, 21-16.

"It is the last stop of the year-long Olympic qualifications and is very valuable for me," said Wang, who had to compete with Li and the other teammate Wang Shixian for the maximum two allocations in a discipline for Olympic badminton tournament.

"My points and rankings were not good enough before the championships. I bear a lot of pressure. The gold medal today is a boost for me."

In the mixed doubles, Zhang Nan/Zhao Yunlei, the world-number-one pair and London Olympic champions, beat Tontowi Ahmad/Liliyana Natsir of Indonesia 16-21, 21-9, 21-17.

In the men's doubles, China's promising young pair Li Junhui/Liu Yuchen dragged the top seed Lee Yong Dae/Yoo Yeon Seong of South Korea to a tough battle, losing at 21-14, 28-26.

Misaki Matsutomo/Ayaka Takahashi of Japan beat their teammates Naoko Fukuman/Kurumi Yonao 21-13, 21-15 to win the women's doubles. Enditem