Malaysia’s hopes of a top-eight finish at the Men’s World Team Championships were snuffed out after they fell 2-0 to Germany in the second round in Washington on Wednesday.
The 10th seeds had earned their spot in the second round after finishing second in Group C behind France.
But they found fifth seeds Germany just a bridge too far as they went down in a rather tame defeat at the Squash On Fire Complex.
In a 3-1-2 order of play, third-string Syafiq Kamal was handed the responsibility of putting Malaysia on the board first.
However, the World No 87 was a big letdown as he lost 11-7, 11-9, 12-10 to 144th-ranked Valentin Rapp.
That put the pressure on national No 1 Ng Eain Yow to salvage the tie against World No 6 Simon Rosner.
But the World No 31, coming off a fine win over Colombia’s World No 10 Miguel Rodriguez a day earlier, couldn’t back that up as he lost 11-7, 11-6, 11-5 to the towering German.
“Rosner is at a different level compared to Rodriguez. And I was still feeling tired from my match a day earlier,” admitted Eain Yow.
With Germany already sealing the win with a 2-0 lead, the second string tie between Raphael Kandra and Ivan Yuen was not played.
The defeat is a blow to Malaysia who were hoping to improve on their 12th place finish two years.
“The team gave their best and they just came up short against a very strong German squad,” said assistant head coach Andrew Cross.
“Of course, Syafiq winning the third-string tie was the initial plan but his opponent was just better on the day.”
The team’s run is, however, far from over as they still need to compete in the ninth-12th position playoffs.
They are up against sixth seeds Hong Kong with the winner going on to face either Australia or Switzerland.