MEN’S doubles pair Ong Yew Sin-Teo Ee Yi have shown a lot of heart with their fighting displays on the court.
However, the reality for the pair is that they are not producing the results that matter and their hope of qualifying for the Tokyo Olympics is fading fast.
On Wednesday, World No 21 Yew Sin-Ee Yi were shown yet another first round exit, this time at the hands of Indonesian veterans Mohd Ahsan-Hendra Setiawan at the French Open in Paris.
Yew Sin-Ee Yi certainly played well and took the fight to the World No 2 Indonesians in the 21-12, 19-21, 19-21 defeat.
But they lacked the cutting edge in closing off the match as the crafty Ahsan-Setiawan found a way to take the big points and the win.
The loss is now Yew Sin-Ee Yi’s third straight first round exit after suffering similar fates at the Korean and Denmark Open.
Their excellent run at the China Open in September, in which they made the quarter-finals, is now just a memory.
Yew Sin-Ee Yi are now ranked 23rd in the Tokyo qualification race and they are slowly running out of time to close the gap on compatriots Goh V Shem-Tan Wee Kiong (No 10) and Aaron Chia-Soh Wooi Yik (No 17).
A country can have two pairs for the Olympics only if both are ranked in the top eight.
V Shem-Wee Kiong are also going through a poor patch of form and were shown a first round exit in Paris.
That has opened the door for World No 13 Aaron-Wooi Yik to capitalise and they rightly did so by whipping World No 12 Choi Solgyu-Seo Seung-jae of South Korea 21-17, 21-15 in the first round of the French meet on Wednesday.
Aaron-Wooi Yik would be looking to press their advantage when they played Denmark’s World No 8 Kim Astrup-Anders Skaarup Rasmussen in a late match yesterday.