The World No 4 beat Denmark’s Anders Antonsen 21-16, 19-21, 21-11 in 82 minutes.

Zii Jia, the fifth seed, who captured the Thailand Open title last week, was in devastating form when he took 22 minutes to win the first game.

However, the second-seeded Dane made a strong comeback in the next game with some precision play to win in 31 minutes and level the match.

In the rubber game, Zii Jia got off to a jittery start, losing the first two points easily, but recovered quickly to forge ahead 9-3 in 12 minutes. He gave Antonsen no chance after that and raced ahead to win 21-11 in 29 minutes.

For the Malaysian, this will be his first semi-final at home in this series. He had never won a quarter-final match against a Danish player in his career.

In the semi-final tomorrow, Zii Jia will take on Hong Kong’s Angus Ng, whom he defeated at the Thailand Open final in straight games, 21-10, 21-11.