LONDON, Aug 3: Badminton has the Olympic final it wanted after a scandal-marred week, with Lin Dan and Lee Chong Wei powering through their semi-finals on Friday to meet for the gold medal again.

Lin Dan ran over an off-form Lee Hyun-il of South Korea 21-12, 21-10 and No 2-ranked Chong Wei beat No 3 Chen Long of China 21-13, 21-14, securing for Malaysia a fifth ever Olympic medal, all of them in badminton.

Chong Wei won the fourth medal, a silver, in Beijing, where he was routed in the final by Lin. Lee will play for bronze, four years after losing the bronze playoff in Beijing.

The women’s final on Saturday will be an all-Chinese contest between world champion Wang Yihan and the only players she fears, Li Xuerui.

Wang Yihan deflated a nation of over a billion people when she thrashed India’s strong title hope Saina Nehwal.

Nehwal’s run to the semi-finals raised a tidal wave of expectation in her home country but she admitted to suffering an attack of nerves as she crumbled 21-13, 21-13, despite the overwhelming support of the Wembley Arena crowd.

“I was struggling to move properly,” she told reporters. “I was feeling a little bit (nervous), I think. I was not playing my strokes freely and I was just too much in a hurry.”

Li, meanwhile, prevailed 22-20, 21-18 to continue her stunning rise to the pinnacle of world badminton, having come from nowhere to win 30 straight matches in the leadup to the Games.

In the mixed doubles, China’s top seeds Zhang Nan and Zhao Yunlei defeated compatriots Chen Xu and Ma Jin, the second seeds, 21-11, 21-17 to win the Olympic mixed doubles badminton title.

Denmark’s Joachim Fischer and Christinna Pedersen defeated Tontowi Ahmad and Liliyana Natsir of Indonesia 21-12, 21-12 for the bronze.—Agencies