Taiwanese men’s doubles, Lee Yang/Wang Chi-Lin, successfully defended their gold medal at the 2024 Paris Olympics. Lee/Wang defeated the top seeds from China, Liang Wei Keng/Wang Chang, with a score of 21-17, 18-21, 21-19 at the Porte de la Chapelle Arena, Sunday (4/8/2024).
This is the second Olympic gold medal for Lee/Wang. Four years ago, they became champions after defeating Li Junhui/Liu Yu Chen (China). Lee Yang/Wang Chi-Lin followed in the footsteps of Chinese legend, Fu Hai Feng, who successfully won consecutive Olympics in the men’s doubles sector.
Fu Hai Feng once won two gold medals with different partners at the 2012 London Olympics and the 2016 Rio Olympics. He stood on the podium at the 2012 London Olympics with Cai Yun. Four years later, Fu Hai Feng won gold again with Zhang Nan.
Lee/Wang’s success in defending their Olympic gold medals felt special considering they were struggling after bringing gold from Tokyo. They last won the 2023 Japan Open. In fact, Lee/Wang have never made it to the semifinals since early 2024. These results have knocked Lee/Wang down to 12th place in the BWF rankings after reaching their highest position of second in September and October 2022.
They are also trapped in the “hell” group at the 2024 Paris Olympics with Kim Astrup/Anders Skaarup Rasmussen (Denmark), Liu Yu Chen/Ou Xuan Yi (China), Takuro Hoki/Yugo Kobayashi (Japan), and Vinson Chu/Joshua Yuan (United States). However, they won the group without losing.
Lee/Wang realized that there were doubts about their abilities ahead of the Paris Olympics. Now, they are grateful and relieved to finally be able to prove themselves on the world stage again.
“Last time in Tokyo not many people recognized us, but this time many people can recognize us,” said Lee Yang as quoted by BWF. “In the past three years we haven’t played well. Before coming to Paris, we heard some voices saying that they don’t want us to represent Taiwan,” he said. “I’m glad that with such a tight competition and being in the toughest group, we were still able to win the gold medal. I’m very happy that our efforts are seen by everyone,” he added. “Before the competition (Olympics), we went through a lot of ups and downs, there were a lot of doubts and finally we proved ourselves again at the Olympics,” Wang Chi-Lin added.
