Chinese fight back to win mixed doubles

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Sydney: China's Zhang Jun and Gao Ling recovered from a first game disaster to beat Indonesia's Tri Kusharyanto and Minarti Timur to take the Olympic badminton mixed doubles gold medal on Thursday.

The Chinese second seeds scored just one point in a nine-minute opening game but fought back brilliantly to win 1-15, 15-13, 15-11 against the world's top-ranked pair.

The Indonesians had beaten these Chinese opponents twice this year and must have been glancing towards the nearby podium when they took the first game barely breaking a sweat.

But Zhang and Gao were a different proposition in the second, playing far more aggressively to build a 12-9 lead.

The Indonesians hit back to edge 13-12 ahead only for the Chinese to take the game. They continued their run by building a 4-0 lead in the decider only for the favourites to claw back to 4-3.

The frantic action was all taking place in front of a wild crowd of screaming fans of both countries, producing a great atmosphere.

Zhang was reaching incredible heights to rain down fierce smashes at Timur and the tactic paid off as a run of seven points took the Chinese to 11-3, again the Indonesians fought back to trail 11-13 with Kusharyanto making one spectacular save to prevent a match point.



(c) Reuters Limited.