After knocking out Indonesia's mighty Minions yesterday, men's doubles Aaron Chia-Soh Wooi Yik feel they are ready to take their chances, even winning Malaysia's first Olympic gold medal in Tokyo.
Despite seven straight defeats against World No 1 Marcus Fernaldi Gideon-Kevin Sanjaya Sukamuljo, the Malaysian pair produced a sizzling performance to oust the Indonesians 21-14, 21-17 in the quarter-finals at Musashino Forest Sport Plaza.
The World No 9, however, face another tall order today in the form of China's Li Jun Hui-Liu Yu Chen in the semi-final.
A win against the World No 6 will not only guarantee Aaron-Wooi Yik a place in the final but a silver medal, at least, in their Olympic debut.
But the thing is Aaron-Wooi Yik have never beaten the former world champions in all five previous meetings.
"I realised that the Olympics are unlike any other tournament we've played in. It is really anybody's game.
"When we played Marcus-Kevin in the quarter-finals, we could sense that the pressure was on them.
"As the World No 1 and favourites to win the gold, the expectation could have weighed them down.
"On a positive note, Wooi Yik and I are more confident now. We want to continue playing as underdogs.
"It doesn't matter that we have never beaten the China pair before. We just need to believe in ourselves and play our game.
"We got nothing to lose," Aaron told Timesport yesterday.
Jun Hui-Liu Chen are looking solid in the Tokyo Games despite it being their first tournament outside China since last year's All England due to Covid-19 restrictions.
In the quarter-finals yesterday, the China duo had to dig deep to defeat Denmark's Kim Astrup-Anders Skaarup Rasmussen 12-21, 21-14, 21-19.
Indonesia's World No 2 Mohammad Ahsan-Hendra Setiawan play Taiwan's Lee Yang-Wang Chi Lin in the other semi-final.
Ahsan-Hendra defeated Japan's Takeshi Kamura-Keigo Sonoda 21-14, 16-21, 21-9, while Lee Yang-Chi Lin overcame another Japanese duo Hiroyuki Endo-Yuta Watanabe 21-16, 21-19 in yesterday's quarter-finals.