By Neha Aggarwal

On 6th December at the Sun International 2016 World Junior Championship here in Cape Town, South Africa, Korea Republic’s pair Cho Seungmin and Kim Jiho continued their winning streak in the mixed doubles event. Yesterday they beat the top pair from Japan- Tomokazu Harimoto and Miu Hirano in straight games. Today was no different.

In the semi finals today, they beat Chinese pair of Xu Haidong and Yuan Yuan in a match that went on to six games 9-11, 11-8, 9-11, 12-10,13-11, 11-8, thus moving to the final round of the competition.

In the other semi finals, Yuki Matsuyama and Hina Hayata (JPN) knocked out the pair of Darko Jorgic (SLO) and Izabela Lupulesku (SRB) in a similar fashion with six games victory 11-6, 11-13, 4-11, 11-6,11-3, 11-9.

With this, this is will be the only second time that a Chinese pair will NOT win the mixed doubles title. The last time this happened was in 2005 World Junior Championship at Linz when the pair from Korea Republic- Kang Dong Hoon and Shim Se Rom won the coveted title.

With more and more titles slipping out of the hands of the Chinese, it is a huge positive sign for the rest of the world to dream big and catch up with the most successful country in this sport.

Korea will be aiming for the second mixed doubles title in the history of the World Junior Championships, but with Japan refusing to bow down, it will be an thriller to watch.

The finals will be played on the final day, 7th December, at 13:00 hours local time.

Catch all the action LIVE on ITTF.com/itTV