Danish doubles champions need 10 match points to get through first round

Defending men's doubles champions Jens Eriksen and Martin Lundgaard needed 10 match points Wednesday to close out a victory over Hendri Kurniawan Saputra and Hendra Wijaya in the opening round of the All England Open Championships.

Photo: Danish doubles champions need 10 match points to get through first round

The second-seeded Danes were up 18-9 in the deciding game, three points from victory. But the Singapore pair came back to 20-20. Saputra and Wijaya were never able to take the lead, though, and the Danes eventually prevailed, 21-15, 12-21, 28-26.

"This can happen with the new scoring system," Lundgaard said. "The other side get the serve and sometimes you can't get back the momentum. It's happened like this before to us."

Commonwealth champion and third-seeded Lee Chong Wei of Malaysia took just 18 minutes to beat India's Chetan Anand 21-12, 21-4.

But his teammate Lee Tsuen Seng lost to Indonesian qualifier Simon Santoso 13-21, 21-13, 21-9. Santoso was joined in the second round by Sony Dwi Kuncoro, who beat Germany's Bjoern Joppien 21-8, 21-15.

Japan's Shoji Sato, who came through Tuesday's qualifying into the main draw, kept up his winning form by beating Singapore's Lee Yen Hui Kendrick 21-12, 21-14, reports AP.

Later, world and defending champion Lin Dan of China opened his bid for a third All England title against Muhammad Roslin Hashim of Malaysia. Second-seeded Chen Jin of China met Andrew Smith, England's only representative in either singles.