DESPITE recovering from a back injury, Lee Zii Jia crashed out of the semi-finals of the World Tour Finals in Bali yesterday.
After coming out tops in the group stage on Friday, the Malaysian No 1 failed to get the better of Thailand's Kunlavut Vitidsarn, losing in straight games 21-18, 21-18.
Ironically, All England champion Zii Jia had earlier defeated the Thai world No 23 in the opening group tie on Wednesday.
For Kunlavut, it was a historic moment as he became the first Thai singles player to reach the final of the season ending finale.
He will face the winner of the match between Tokyo Olympic champion Viktor Axelsen of Denmark and India's Lakshya Sen.
As for Zii Jia, he will need to quickly put the defeat behind him and shift his focus towards the World Championships in Huelva, Spain next week.
"I'm disappointed with my performance today but Kunlavut was the better player. He was more patient and was dictating the pace.
"He played a much better game than in the group stages.
"However, I can still take heart from my performance, which was so much better than the 2020 World Tour Finals in January. For now, I look forward to a good World Championships."
Zii Jia's defeat was also the end of Malaysia's interest in the championships following the exits of independent men's doubles Ong Yew Sin-Teo Ee Yi and mixed doubles Chan Peng Soon-Goh Liu Ying.
World No 11 Yew Sin-Ee Yi, who did well to qualify for the last four, lost 21-18, 21-15 to high flying Japanese duo Takuro Hoki-Yugo Kobayashi.
The Japanese pair, ranked No 6 in the world, will face either Olympic champions Lee Yang-Wang Chi Lin of Taiwan or world No 1 Marcus Fernaldi Gideon-Kevin Sanjaya Sukamuljo in the final.
In the mixed doubles, Peng Soon-Liu Ying were outclassed by world No 2 Dechapol Puavaranukroh-Sapsiree Taerattanachai of Thailand, who notched a 21-8, 21-18 win in just 42 minutes.
The Thai pair will be hoping to make it three out of three titles in Bali, when they play Japan's Yuta Watanabe-Arisa Higashino today. They won the Indonesia Masters and Indonesia Open titles last month.