Badminton News: Viktor Axelsen and Akane Yamaguchi BWF World Tour Finals singles championships

Japanese shuttler Akane Yamaguchi bagged the title in the women's category after beating Tai Tzu-Ying of Taiwan 21-18, 22-20 in the championship match.

Both players were evenly matched on the scoresheet, but Yamaguchi took complete control of the match against Tzu-Ying. The 25-year-old Japanese shuttler secured the victory over her Taiwanese opponent after 46 minutes to win the BWF World Tour Finals since last doing so five years ago.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">By Shi Tang <a href="https://t.co/MG6gvbwr3B">pic.twitter.com/MG6gvbwr3B</a></p>&mdash; Viktor Axelsen (@ViktorAxelsen) <a href="https://twitter.com/ViktorAxelsen/status/1602183094878208001?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 12, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

The BWF World Tour Finals trophy made Yamaguchi the first Japanese woman to claim World Championships, All England Open and the end-of-season finals in the same year since Ye Zhaoying in 1997.

Yamaguchi said: "She kept coming at me, to put pressure on me. But I wanted to be aggressive to hold on to the lead. I don't know if it's the best I have ever played, but I did have a good week here."

Tzu-Ying was aiming to win her third WTF title but failed to match the quick returns of her Japanese opponent.

She said: "I thought she was slightly faster than me. I wanted to attack because my defence wasn't great today. But unfortunately, I couldn't cut down on my errors and her net play was very good."

The victory over Ginting in the men's singles championship match helped Axelsen claim his eighth title of the year.

Defending champion Axelsen cruised past  Ginting to claim a 21-13 victory in the first game. He continued with his winning momentum in the second game and went into the break with an eight-point lead.

Ginting tried to pull off a reversal in the final moments of the second game. However, he failed to match the tactics and stamina of Axelsen as the Danish shuttler eventually secured a 21-13, 21-14 victory.

After the victory,  Axelsen said: "It feels absolutely amazing. I couldn't have wished for a better ending [to the year]."