The Korea Open starts on Tuesday 3 November at the Jinnam Stadium in Yeosu, and the headline is who turned up. An Se-young said yes after days of doubt about her fitness. The defending men’s singles champion, Jonatan Christie, has withdrawn, and so have several of the biggest names in the men’s draw.
The week in brief
This is a Super 500 with US$500,000 in prize money, the first stop of the Asian swing after four weeks in Europe. Qualifying and the men’s and women’s doubles first round are on Tuesday, the other first-round matches follow on Wednesday, the round of 16 is on Thursday 5 November and the finals are on Sunday 8 November.
Women’s singles
An is top seed and plays her first match against Bulgaria’s Kaloyana Nalbantova. She has won ten titles this season, the Denmark Open and French Open among them, and a win in Yeosu would be her eleventh. She has already said she will skip the Japan Masters the following week to rest. Behind her are Japan’s Akane Yamaguchi (second seed) and Tomoka Miyazaki (third), with Korea’s Sim Yu-jin seeded fourth.
Yamaguchi is the defending champion. She beat An in last year’s final in Suwon, which is worth remembering before anyone hands An the trophy. Pusarla V. Sindhu, who won the Hylo Open on Sunday, has withdrawn, as has Korea’s Kim Ga-eun.
Men’s singles
Chou Tien-chen of Chinese Taipei is top seed and Japan’s Kodai Naraoka is seeded third. Lakshya Sen is also out after his title in Saarbrücken.
That leaves room. Indonesia have six men’s singles players entered, including Anthony Sinisuka Ginting, Alwi Farhan and Moh. Zaki Ubaidillah, runner-up at the French Open. HS Prannoy leads India and opens against Korea’s Yoo Tae-bin.
Men’s doubles
Seo Seung-jae and Kim Won-ho, the world No. 1 pair, defend the title in front of a home crowd. Malaysia’s Aaron Chia and Soh Wooi Yik, ranked fourth in the world and seeded second, are the obvious threat. Japan’s Takuro Hoki and Yugo Kobayashi are seeded fifth. Indonesia have not entered a men’s pair at all.
Women’s doubles
Korea’s Baek Ha-na and Lee So-hee, world and Asian Games champions this year, have withdrawn, so the home crowd loses its best women’s pair before a shuttle is hit. That puts the spotlight on Japan’s Rin Iwanaga and Kie Nakanishi, the second seeds and last year’s runners-up. The 2025 title went to Kim Hye-jeong and Kong Hee-yong.
Mixed doubles
China’s Feng Yanzhe and Huang Dongping won here last year. Of this year’s seeds, Japan’s Yuta Watanabe and Maya Taguchi are fourth, Akira Koga and Natsu Saito fifth, and China’s Zhu Yijun and Li Qian seventh. The home pair to watch is Kim Jae-hyeon and Jang Ha-jeong; Kim won the mixed title at the Asia Championships in April.
What is at stake for Hangzhou
The World Tour Finals in Hangzhou (9–13 December) take eight players or pairs per discipline. Some places are already settled: An is in as world champion. For everyone else, the next three weeks are three Super 500s in a row, Yeosu, Kumamoto and Hong Kong.
A title here is worth 9,200 points, a final 7,800 and a semi-final 6,420. With so many leading men missing, a men’s singles semi-final in Yeosu is unusually cheap to reach by Super 500 standards, and the players chasing the last places in the top eight will know it. The same goes for the women’s doubles pairs who find Baek and Lee missing.
How to follow it
Draws, order of play and live scores are on the BWF World Tour site. We add the five champions to our results page after the finals on Sunday 8 November. Dates and levels for the rest of the season are in our calendar, and the Race to the Finals page shows the points still available before Hangzhou.
Rule of thumb for this week: when the top seeds stay at home, back the players who are fresh rather than the ones who are famous.
