China’s Huang Sui (left) and Gao Ling in action against Japan’s Shizuka Yamamoto and Yamada Seiko in Jakarta on Thursday. (AFP)

Jakarta, May 13 (AFP): Defending champions China remained on course for a fourth successive Uber Cup women’s badminton title Thursday with a crushing 3-0 semi-final victory over Japan.

World number one Gong Ruina dropped only four points to 11th-ranked Kanako Yonekura in a quick-fire first game before Gao Ling and Huang Sui, badminton’s second best doubles pairing, beat Shizuka Yamamoto-Seiko Yamada 15-3, 15-2.

World number two Zhang Ning encountered greater difficulty against Kaori Mori, ranked 13, but still wrapped up the tie 11-7, 11-7.

“Today the first singles and first doubles played very well but the second singles was not very good,” said China’s head coach Li Yongbo.

“She didn’t play as well as she can. Japan played quite well — they are all hard-running and showed good fighting spirit but China were still the better team.”

Shuji Matsuno, head coach of Japan’s women, tipped China to lift the trophy. “China are very strong but we tried our best to win this game,” he said. He added that Japan were happy with the bronze medal awarded to both losing semi-finalists.

Meanwhile Indonesia’s team manager has warned his men face a tough task in turning over second seeds Denmark for a chance to extend their 10-year reign in the concurrent Thomas Cup.

Speaking after Indonesia’s quarter final triumph over arch-rivals Malaysia, Christian Hadinata said the Danes were a balanced team with strong players throughout.

“Denmark have balance and quality in all players, doubles and singles, so we are just going to tell our players to do our best,” Hadinata said ahead of Friday’s semi-final.

Meanwhile, on Wednesday, defending champions Indonesia revived their flagging Thomas Cup hopes with a spirited 3-1 reverse of arch-rivals Malaysia (as reported in the Late City edition Thursday).