KUALA LUMPUR: National doubles pair Aaron Chia-Soh Wooi Yik look like they have what it takes to end Malaysia's long wait for a first Olympic gold.
The former world champions were slow off the blocks at the ongoing All England championships, but have been impressive in the business end of the competition.
They struggled to overcome unfancied Taiwanese pair Chang Ko Chi-Po Li Wei in the second round (21-18, 24-22) but raised their game to defeat 2022 All England winners Muhammad Shohibul Fikri-Bagas Maulana in the quarter-finals (21-16, 21-15).
Aaron-Wooi Yik then dispatched Taiwan's Lee Jhe Huei-Yang Po Hsuan in the semi-finals (21-16, 21-15) to book their spot in the final.
Aaron-Wooi Yik have a knack of going deep in the really big tournaments.
They won the world title in 2022, as well as bronze at both the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and 2022 Hangzhou Asian Games.
The duo, however, have only one World Tour title (2023 Denmark Open) to their name.
With only four months to go until the Paris Olympics, former Badminton Association of Malaysia (BAM) high-performance director Datuk James Selvaraj believes the duo have to improve on their consistency as they will face stiff opposition for gold.
India's world No.1 Satwiksairaj Rankireddy-Chirag Shetty, current world champions Kang Min Hyuk-Seo Seung Jae of South Korea and 2021 world champions Takuro Hoki-Yugo Kobayashi of Japan are among the favourites.
Former All England champions Mohammad Ahsan-Hendra Setiawan (Indonesia) may be on the wane but remain a threat, as do China's Liang Wei Keng-Wang Chang and Ren Xiangyu-He Ji Ting.
"Aaron-Wooi Yik need to be consistent with their performances. They are former world champions, there's no doubting their abilities," said James today.
"I think they need to work on their mental strength, BAM have psychologist Frederick Tan to help the players now. They need to work on solutions to allow our players to consistently produce results.
"Our players seem to be weighed down when they step onto the court, I don't think it's a problem with their abilities, they seem to have self-doubt and this is something that we need to fix."
James said the team's coaching staff need to analyse player's performances and come out with solutions to improve after every match.
"It's tough in the men's doubles, there are just so many quality pairs and it can be anyone's game. The coaching team needs to work harder to prepare the players.
"Double coach Tan Bin Shen needs to communicate with BAM coaching director Rexy Mainaky and update him on what's happening with the players.
They must have plan A and B during matches.
"We need the players to visualise and plan what they are going to do during matches, we cannot be waiting for opponents to take charge in the matches.
"We need to be in control, I really hope to see this happen with our players."