All England: An Se-young crowned again after 95-minute epic against Wang Zhi Yi in all-time classic | Badminton News
It was supposed to be the first year when women’s singles at the All England would feel the absence of legends like Tai Tzu-ying and Carolina Marin, lost to retirements and ravaged knees. A bunch of former champions – Chen Yufei, Nozomi Okuhara and Akane Yamaguchi – were fading before watching eyes, and churns of transitions like these take a toll on quality of contests. But An Se-young, the Korean Olympic champion and compulsive winner of most titles on the circuit, came into the Birmingham final, telling herself the crown had to be fought for, that all her great achievements were under lock and key, and this week was a race to the summit, from scratch.
Chinese badminton did not disappoint. It did not let the ball, née shuttle, drop on the breathtaking legacy of women’s singles over the past decade. Wang Zhi Yi, world No 2, and likely Chinese contender for LA Olympics, arrived to fight for that crown. To put up a grand show that makes women’s singles the show-stopper, year after year. In 95 minutes of the most immersive badminton, with crispest quality of strokes from both women, the finals ensured that the golden age needn’t in fact come to a halt or become a single-player monopoly.
“Yes, I’m the King now,” Se-young declared after the 13-21, 21-18, 21-18 titanic battle which jogged memories of THAT Sindhu-Okuhara final from Glasgow. The Korean was 17-18 down and 3 points away from losing in the second set. But the rallies – several 40+ shots – kept rolling in, and it was sheer willpower to not allow the shuttle to hit the floor, as the Chinese retrieved magically, and the Korean refused to fade out even when trailing for large parts.
A battle of wills!
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— BWF (@bwfmedia) March 16, 2025
Se-young was rumoured to be suffering from an illness, but though her shuttles routinely sailed long and wide and reviews came undone, she kept snapping at the taller Zhi Yi’s heels.
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“I trust myself. No thinking. Just keep going. Just keep going,” Se-young would explain later. The plan was brilliant in its simplicity, like a simple geometric hypotenuse. Se-young made Zhi Yi, who isn’t bad at retrieving low at all, shuttle across the diagonal over and over again. The far forehand on the right back corner and the backhand on the forecourt lunge left corner.
It wasn’t about yo-yoing the Chinese who had her smashes and net scythe winners to accumulate points, when working this line. It was about convincing the Chinese that she might retrieve the shuttle 50 times, but Se-young will get those two corner placements pat the 51st. The to-and-fro was so attritional that at 13-13 in the decider, you wondered and knew that this would be exactly on knife edge even at 19-all. The two women kept trading points till 18-18, before Zhi Yi finally shanked a return from the far forehand corner. 18-19. And then messed up at the net. 18-20. And the Chinese was finally tamed.
South Korea’s Young An Se celebrates after defeating China’s Wang Zhi Yi in the women’s singles final match at the All England Open Badminton Championships at the Utilita Arena in Birmingham, England, Sunday, March 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Rui Vieira)
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