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Gopi makes Malaysian Open quarters

Pullela Gopichand of India upset fourth seeded Ji Xinpeng of China in straight games to move into the quarterfinals of the Malaysian Open at the Malawati Stadium in Kuala Lumpur.

The Indian national champion mixed tight defence with some aggressive strokeplay to win 15-13, 15-5.

This is Gopi's second win over Ji, having earlier triumphed, again in straight games, at the German Open in late 1999.

Here Ji, looking for revenge, began with a barrage of aggressive smashes in the first game, but Gopi tightened up his defence and frustrated his opponent's attempts to smash his way through. That failure seemed to break the morale of the Chinese star, who folded tamely in the second game.

In other action, top seed Taufik Hidayat of Indonesia, struggling with back problems, defeated Malaysia's Roslin Hashim 15-13, 15-13 while second seed Xia Xuanze of China had a fluent 15-9, 15-4 win over Germany's Bjoern Joppien.

Defending champion Luo Yigang of China strolled through a 15-12, 15-10 win over Britain's Richard Vaughan, home boy Wong Choon Hann beat Boonsak Polsana of Thailand 15-7, 15-6 and Japan's Keita Matsuda had an upset win over Indonesia's Indra Wijaya 15-2, 3-15, 15-10.

With that, the last eight lineup is now complete.