KUALA LUMPUR: Shuttler Ong Xin Yee's hopes of claiming two individual medals at the World Junior Championships in Spokane, United States were dashed on Thursday.
The 17-year-old could only reach one quarter-final in the girls' doubles with Carmen Ting, after claiming a hard-fought 15-21, 21-7, 21-11 win over Pan-Am junior champions Chloe Ho-Ella Lin of the United States on Friday.
Xin Yee was in the singles action several hours earlier, going down fighting 21-9, 18-21, 21-15 to Japan's Mihane Endo.
Playing in both singles and doubles is certainly no easy task especially when it comes to a major tournament.
It's worth pointing out that all of the quarter-finalists in both the boys' and girls' singles are competing in only one event.
With one event left, Xin Yee will surely be going all out to salvage a podium finish in the doubles event.
After all, she and Carmen are only one win away from doing so. They will face a strong challenge from Japanese opponents Maya Taguchi-Aya Tamaki next.
It was nevertheless a good last-16 campaign for Malaysia with Faiq Haziq, Bryan Jeremy Goonting-Aaron Tai and Low Han Chen-Chong Jie Yu also making it through to the next stage in their respective boys' singles, boys' doubles and mixed doubles events.
Faiq will face his career's biggest match yet going up against reigning Asian junior champion Hu Zhe An of China, after clinching a dominant 21-18, 21-7 win over Denmark's Alexander Ringbaek.
Fifth seeds Bryan-Aaron, meanwhile, tamed India's Nicholas Raj-Tushar Suveer 21-14, 21-17 to set up the next meeting with Kosuke Kakuta-Kaito Sugawara of Japan.
Kang Khai Xing-Han Chen failed to make it two Malaysians in the last eight as they went down fighting 11-21, 21-17, 21-12 to China's Chen Yong Rui-Hu Ke Yuan.
Han Chen will now turn to the mixed doubles to resume his bid for a medal as he and Jie Yu seek to overcome Indonesia's Adrian Pratama-Felisha Pasaribu next.
Han Chen-Jie Yu easily advanced after whipping Spain's Rodrigo Sanjurjo-Nikol Carulla 21-9, 21-10.
The last time Malaysian shuttlers finished on the WJC podium was in Markham, Canada in 2018.
Then Goh Jin Wei clinched her second girls' singles title while Pearly Tan-Toh Ee Wei finished runners-up in the girls' doubles.