China's Chen Hong celebrates his victory against Denmark's Peter Gade at the end of their match at the World Badminton Championships in Madrid September 22, 2006.
But the bigger surprise was in the womens doubles. They dropped world number one Yang Wei-Zhang Jiewen for the seventh ranked Du Jing-Yu Yang.
China will still boast an awesome1 line-up in the mens singles for the championships, which will be held at the Putra Stadium in Bukit Jalil from Aug 13-19. The others in the team are Lin Dan, Chen Jin and Bao Chunlai, who are now ranked at number one, two and six in the world respectively.
For the World Championships, a country can have a maximum of four players or pairs in each event if they are ranked among the TOP eight in the world at the end of the qualification period.
For the mens doubles, China will be represented by world number one Fu Haifeng-Cai Yun and the 51st ranked Guo Zhendong-Xie Zhongbo. Haifeng-Cai Yun won the last two Super Series tournaments in Singapore and Indonesia earlier this month.
In the womens singles, China look unbeatable with the TOP four slots in the world rankings taken up by Xie Xingfang, Zhang Ning, Zhu Lin and Lu Lan respectively.
In the womens doubles, the Chinese will bank on Gao Ling-Huang Sui, Zhang Yawen-Wei Yili and Du Jing-Yu Yang to do the job for them.
South Korean Lee Hyun-il, a bronze medallist in the last World Championships in Madrid last year, will not be in Kuala Lumpur even though he is the highest ranked Korean in the mens singles from the Phase II list of qualifiers.
The South Koreans have opted2 for Shon Seung-mo and Park Sung-hwan.
Hyun-il, who is ranked 13th in the world, has been dropped from the national team for indiscipline
