The Malaysians were hoping to exact revenge after having lost to them in the opening group tie last week but they went down 17-21, 21-17, 11-21 in a match that lasted 65 minutes at the Olympic Sports Centre Gymnasium in Hangzhou, China.

Sze Fei-Nur Izzuddin, who created history by being the first Malaysian men’s doubles pair to enter the Tour final since its inception in 2018, will take home the runners-up prize money of US$100,000 (RM445,000).

Commenting on their performance later, Sze Fei admitted that he and his partner couldn’t find the right strategy to overcome the Danes, who were runners-up at the 2023 World Championships .

Izzuddin praised the Danes, reigning European champions, for their superior tactics and patience in clinching the title at the season finale.

Sze Fei-Izzudin have put on an outstanding performance this year despite their loss to the world No 3 pair in this Super 1000 series.

“This season has been good for us, we’ve achieved things we’ve never done before and hope we can be better next year,” Izzuddin said in an audio recording released by the Badminton World Federation.

As runners-up in the World Tour double’s final, they earned 12,000 points which will leap them to No 3 in the BWF rankings from their current seventh position.

Sze Fei-Nur Izzuddin had won the BWF Japan Open (Super 750), China (Super 1000) and Arctic Open (Super 500) championships. According to records, very few top pairs have achieved this.

The pair have earned about RM1.3 million from these tournaments and four others in the past four months.

Earlier today, national top mixed doubles pair Chen Tang Jie-Toh Ee Wei also missed out on a chance to capture the WTF 2024 title after a thrilling rubber-game loss to Olympic gold medallists Zheng Si Wei-Huang Ya Qiong, 18-21, 21-14, 17-21, in a 75-minute battle.