Hong Kong's Jiang Huajun continued her impressive run in the Kuwait Open when she stormed through to the semi-finals in the women's singles of the US$200,000 tournament last night.
Jiang, who caused a shock upset by defeating reigning Olympic and world champion Zhang Yining of China 4-2 in an earlier round, had no difficulty of putting off the challenge of Italian Tan Monfardini Wenling in the quarter-finals with a 4-0 victory.
The 21-year-old, who moved to Hong Kong in October, will face a tough battle in the semi-finals, however, as she will meet up-and-coming Guo Yan of China. The latter edged out former world number one and compatriot Wang Nan 4-3 in another quarter-final.
Talking about her match against Zhang, Jiang said, 'Today I played without pressure, the pressure was on her not me.'
Zhang has enjoyed a successful run since she took the singles gold medal at the Olympic Games 2004. She then made a clean swept in the World Championships, the World Cup, National Games and the Pro Tour grand finals in 2005.
She was also the singles champion in the Qatar Open the week before and is China's biggest hope for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
