Badminton greats Lin Dan and Lee Chong Wei look likely to contest a 40th instalment of their rivalry at the All England Championships starting on Wednesday.
The apparently ageless players have been drawn to meet in the quarterfinals of the world's oldest badminton tournament, with 35-year-old Chong Wei returning as titleholder in what may be his last All England, and Lin, a mere 34, still capable of moments of genius which have made him the most celebrated player of all time.
FILE - A Wednesday, Jan. 17, 2018 file photo of two-time Olympic champion, Lin Dan of China returning a shot to Ihsan Maulana Mustofa of Indonesia during the first round of the men's singles match in the 2018 Malaysia Masters badminton tournament in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. (AP Photo/Sadiq Asyraf, File)
Chong Wei has also become the top seed following the sudden withdrawal of Viktor Axelsen, the world champion from Denmark, who had an operation on an ankle he injured last month at the Indonesian Masters.
Although Lin is seeded only sixth, he has won 27 of his memorable encounters with Chong Wei, and holds six All England men's singles titles to Chong Wei's four. A seventh would put Lin close to the all-time record of eight won by Indonesia's Rudy Hartono in the 1960s-70s, when the tournament was the unofficial world championship.
The form of the brilliantly versatile left-hander from China may be more variable these days but, when fully prepared, Lin is capable of challenging for major titles, as shown by his run to the world championships final in Glasgow in August.
Lin also knows how much this week means to Chong Wei, who changed his mind about saying farewell to the 118-year-old tournament after regaining the All England title unexpectedly last year. The Malaysian's delight at winning the final against Shi Yuqi, another Chinese player, brought the immediate announcement that he would return for a 14th visit to his favorite tournament.
"Every year I come here I feel like I am playing at home," said Chong Wei, whose light-footed containment and killing ambushes endure.
"You can feel it is different from any other tournament and will always hold a special place in my heart."
If Chong Wei achieves a fifth title, he will have more than any other Malaysian, overtaking two greats of the 1950s, Wong Peng Soon and Eddy Choong.
It may help the winner of a Chong Wei-Lin confrontation that Axelsen is absent, but more immediate beneficiaries should be Son Wan Ho, the fifth-seeded South Korean, and Chen Long, the fourth-seeded Olympic champion from China, who were both drawn in the injured Dane's half.
FILE -A Sunday, Nov. 26, 2017 file photo of Lee Chong Wei of Malaysia returning a shot to Chen Long of China in the final of the men's singles during the Yonex-Sunrise Hong Kong Open Badminton Championships 2017 in Hong Kong. (AP Photo/Vincent Yu, File)
The women's singles has never had so many potential winners.
Top seed is Tai Tzu Ying, the superbly skilful titleholder from Taiwan, but she has a uniquely high-profile first round against Saina Nehwal, the former world No. 1 from India and a bronze medalist at the London Olympics.
Among Tai's other challengers are two Japanese players, Nozomi Ohuhara, the world champion, and Akane Yamaguchi, the World Superseries titleholder. There's also Carolina Marin, the Olympic champion from Spain, and Ratchanok Intanon, the former world champion from Thailand, and another Indian, Pusarla Sindhu, the worlds runner-up.
ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan’s defense minister warned Afghanistan on Wednesday that any new “terrorist or suicide attack” by militants on Pakistani soil would draw a stern response, hours after talks between the two countries in Istanbul failed to secure a peace agreement.
Earlier this month, Pakistan's military launched attacks on what it said were hideouts of the Pakistani Taliban in Afghanistan, killing dozens of people whom it described as insurgents. Afghanistan said that the people killed were civilians and struck Pakistani military posts in response, claiming 58 Pakistani soldiers were killed.
Pakistan's military said the border fighting left 23 soldiers dead.
The two sides agreed to a ceasefire brokered in the Qatari capital, Doha, on Oct. 19, followed by four days of talks this week in Istanbul that ended inconclusively.
In a post on X, Pakistan's Defense Minister Khawaja Mohammad Asif told Afghanistan’s Taliban government that “any terrorist attack or suicide bombing inside Pakistan shall give you the bitter taste of such misadventures.”
There was no immediate comment from Kabul on the collapse of peace talks or on Asif’s remarks, but Afghanistan’s state broadcaster RTA reported that the negotiations stalled because of what it called “irrational demands” from Pakistan.
According to RTA, Islamabad sought assurances that no attacks would be launched from Afghan territory, while the Taliban delegation said the Pakistani Taliban, also known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, was an internal issue for Islamabad.
Pakistan has long accused Afghanistan's Taliban government of turning a blind eye to Pakistani Taliban and other militants operating from its territory. Kabul denies the charge.
The Pakistani military said Wednesday it killed seven Pakistani Taliban militants in an operation in Kurram, a district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. Six soldiers were also killed, the statement said, adding that a search was underway for runaway gunmen.
Pakistan has witnessed a surge in militant attacks, most claimed by the Pakistani Taliban, which is a separate group from the Afghan Taliban but has been emboldened since the latter returned to power in Kabul in 2021. Many Pakistani Taliban leaders and fighters have been living in Afghanistan since then.
Asif, in a strongly worded post on X, also accused Kabul of “blindly pushing Afghanistan into yet another conflict” to preserve what he described as its “usurped rule and war economy.”
“Let me assure them that Pakistan does not require to employ even a fraction of its full arsenal to completely obliterate the Taliban regime and push them back to the caves for hiding,” he said.
Despite the failure of the talks, a ceasefire remained in place, and no new clashes were reported along the border. Both countries have shut all major crossings, leaving hundreds of trucks carrying goods and refugees stranded on each side.
Asif told reporters in Islamabad that reopening the border for bilateral and transit trade with Afghanistan was conditional on Kabul’s assurance that Afghan territory would not be used for militant attacks against Pakistan.
He said Pakistan had evidence showing that Afghan soil was used to stage violence in Pakistan, and that information was shared with the Afghan delegation during the Istanbul talks.
Asif said that “terrorists who come from across the border to attack Pakistan will be pursued there, even if they have come from Afghanistan," and that Pakistan could go deep inside Afghanistan to hit such militants.
At the Chaman border crossing in southwestern Balochistan province in Pakistan, hundreds of Afghan refugee families and traders voiced frustration and anxiety over the failed talks.
“We came to know that the talks failed,” said Ajab Khan, an Afghan refugee waiting in a long queue of trucks loaded with household goods. “Now we are going back to Afghanistan, but it’s a scary situation. We don’t know how we will survive there.”
Associated Press writers Abdul Qahar in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, Javed Hussain in Kurram, Pakistan and Riaz Khan in Peshawar, Pakistan, contributed to this report.
Afghan refugees gather beside trucks loaded with their belongings as they wait their turn to leave for their homeland through a border crossing point which partially opens following Oct.19 ceasefire, on the outskirts of Chaman, a border town on the Pakistan Afghan border, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. (AP Photo/H. Achakzai)
Afghan refugees sit beside trucks loaded with their belongings as they wait their turn to leave for their homeland through a border crossing point which partially opens following Oct.19 ceasefire on the outskirts of Chaman, a border town on the Pakistan Afghan border, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. (AP Photo/H. Achakzai)
Afghan refugees sit beside trucks loaded with their belongings as they wait their turn to leave for their homeland through a border crossing point which partially opens following Oct.19 ceasefire, on the outskirts of Chaman, a border town on the Pakistan Afghan border, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. (AP Photo/H. Achakzai)
