Recently in Sports - Badminton Category

There's nothing more interesting to the audience of a sport to hear a smart-alec commentator who acts as though he knows everything be proven wrong.  Well, at least it's interesting to me.  I mean, take a look at the football pundits.  They didn't take Joe Fanboy off the streets, oh no, they actually have qualified experts who've actually kicked a ball in front of live spectators who paid to watch them play the game.  That's great.  Instant credibility right there.  But that doesn't stop them from being wrong, and sometimes, horrendously wrong.

I always grin at the guy who goes, "There's no doubt about it, there's too much quality in the [insert footie club] side", or "I can't see them losing this", and when the match is lost, they go, "No one could have expected this, [insert the above footie club] played well below par, etc, etc".

Nothing wrong with experts making mistakes, of course.  I'm just saying it's entertaining to have them get their faces rubbed in.

So here comes my point (yeah, I belaboured it, so bite me) - if you like this, and if I were a sports commentator, you'd be having some fun at my expense.  I have written off Lee Chong Wei after his not-again loss to Lin Dan at the All-England.  As usual, supporting Chong Wei was an exhausting affair - you kept holding your breath hoping he'd whack Lin Dan, waving your arms and all that only to find that you've been doing it the whole match and you get tired. 

So I watched the Swiss Open final warily.  If there's such a thing as watching a badminton match nonchalantly, I was doing it. And if I was the sports commentator, I would be reiterating the fact that Lin Dan has won the last [insert number] encounters between the two.

But Chong Wei won.  He played the game I was screaming at him to play from my living room during the All-England final last week. 

If I was a sports commentator, I'd be saying, "Lin Dan played well below par, etc, etc."

Maybe I should be a sports commentator.  Hey, ESPN, want someone to relieve Gillian Clark?

I find it utterly unacceptable that none of our 2 major online news channels updated Lee Chong Wei’s win in the Malaysian Open 2008.  We’re talking about a local boy who happens to be World No 1, playing in one of the top international Open tournaments in the world of Badminton, which also happens to be in our freaking backyard!

I understand that TheStar and NST doesn’t have a 24/7 news-cycle, but it’s it about time we did?

The only one that I’m aware of that had this news was Bernama.

When I did a Google search, Bernama wasn’t on the top 10 list.  I had to find out from Channel News Asia, the 24-hour news network from our most beloved of neighbours, Singapore, who had their representatives sent home a long time ago, probably by our players too (I’m out of the country, which is why I had to rely on the net for news).

Google regularly places TheStar as one of the go-to places for badminton news.  I don’t know why, but it regularly appears in Google News.  I would hazard and say that thestar,com.my is far and away the top Malaysian news portal in the world for all things Malaysian.  Why doesn’t it have a 24-hour news cycle, at least for Malaysian-related news?

A search will yield BadmintonCentral forums, rather than a news site.  I don’t have a problem with BadmintonCentral, but I want news immediately, rather than to wade through posts to find what I want.  There’s a time for news articles, and there’s a time for feedback on news.  This is not the time for the latter where I was concerned.

Isn’t it about time that our newspapers start being a little more, how shall I put it, 21st century?  At the very least when our athletes are concerned or for high-profile tournaments held in Malaysia, or (in this case) both, it may project a better image of our ability to provide *our* news at a timely basis if we did something about it.

If you're just joining in, I've written a short series of posts related to my top badminton players of all-time, an entirely personal list of who I think rule the roost in the world of badminton.

If you want to get up to speed, the other posts are as follows:

• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Prelude
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 1
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 2
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 3

In writing this series of posts I thought of a few things.

First is the evolution in sports and how it distorts any reasonable attempts at deciding who's the 'best'.  Not just in badminton, but in almost any sport you care to name.  I don't know about you, but whenever I watch athletes today I wonder constantly how the the greats of yesteryears compare to the greats of today.  As time passes, so many things have changed.  The training methods and tools have improved, the diet that top athletes are being put through now is much more carefully planned, replete with supplements the best technology can produce.  Also on technology, the gear that the athletes have available for them now are far and away much better than before.  The Speedo LZR Racer, for instance, is an example - where of the 77 world records broken to date since its introduction in Feb 2008, 72 of them were by swimmers wearing the hi-tech swimsuit.

Consider how these changes affect sports: for football, the technique in controlling a modern ball is surely different than the old one.  Would Pele be able to compete in today's game?  Consider Navratilova or Evert with someone like Venus or Serena Williams - how could their games compare?  Remember Navratilova has more titles that both of them combined, but I would think that Navratilova's game in her prime could not match the powerplay of either of the Williams sisters.  Would you still pick Navratilova?  People have pondered how Tiger would have performed with Nicklaus or Palmer in their prime.  Who is ultimately the better tennis player, Federer, or Sampras? 

The point is, there really isn't a satisfactory answer.

When I started compiling this list, I kept thinking about the most quantifiable way to justify my list.  Questions similar to the ones I illustrated above come up again and again.  Turns out that there really isn't a foolproof way of doing it, and the list remains subjective, emotional and cannot be proved by empirical evidence (pretty much what I said in the prologue).

Having said that, I believe the standards for the sport are being pushed higher and higher as we go along.  The shuttlers train harder, run further, play stronger, jump higher.  It is this believe I think that so many of the modern players dominate my list.

So anyway, I wanted to use this 'epilogue', of sorts, to acknowledge some of the players that I left out, some who will elicit screams of rage from badminton fans at large.

1. Morten Frost Hansen

For me, it was a toss-up between Yang Yang and Frost.  Frost had a longer and more decorated career, and was certainly not a pushover as a top singles badminton player.  He won practically everything there is to win during his playing days, with the notable exception of the World Championships.  To top it off, he is a brilliant coach, and did wonders for the teams he tenured with (the same could be said of Yang Yang as well, now that I think of it).

If I were blessed with a better memory, I would remember more of Frost's battles, but as it is, it's more Yang Yang than Frost, and to top it off, when he did win a match I remembered, it was against Misbun during the All-England final, breaking my young heart and irrevocably screwed my mental image of him as a bad, bad man.

2. Rudy Hartono

I suppose the only reason he's not in my list is because I've never seen him play.  He dominated All-England for 8 years, and is considered pretty much The Man in Indonesia.  He was also successful in men's doubles, which something that you don't see nowadays at all.

He's in this list because in the course of my research his record pretty much awed me.

3. Zhao Jianhua

Yang Yang is starting to look like a strange choice, doesn't it?  Not only has he edged out Frost, he was also chosen ahead of this gentlemen.  Zhao Jianhua, for all who remembered him, is widely (and I mean widely) regarded to be the best player of all time.  Even now.  His claim to fame: incredibly tricky player with an arsenal of skills.  He's fast, deceptive and deadly.  Unfortunately, he is equally as well known for his inconsistency.  This mercurial player is more unpredictable than Dennis Rodman's hairstyles - you'll never know when he's going to lose.  My most vivid memory of him was his match against Rashid Sidek in 1992 as first singles in the Thomas Cup semi-finals, which Zhao lost.  I remember a dodgy line call that settled the first set for the Malaysian (Zhao was very unhappy with the call), but despite Rashid playing a superbly boring game to neutralize Zhao's attacking, Zhao couldn't get his act together to win. 

(Actually, perhaps I should say Rashid won in spite of playing a superbly boring game.)

Taufik was also tagged as being inconsistent.  But Zhao Jianhua in my mind seemed even more so. 

4. Ge Fei/Gu Jun

Women's doubles pair.  China.  Unbeatable.  Dynamic duo.  Won practically every match I've seen them play.  Could be me, but sometimes I see the boredom in both their eyes when playing in finals of international tournaments. "Sigh, Ge Fei, how I wish they'd just give us the medal now."  "Sigh, look at her, Gu Jun, her hair is in a mess after that body smash I just did."  "Sigh, I wonder what's on TV now?"

And it's so creepy (and weirdly funny) watching Ge Fei, who hardly needs to catch her breath throughout matches.  You'll never see her huffing and puffing like Bao Chunlai (who looks like he's run a marathon after just 3 points).  She's as cool as they come.  "Oh, another point.  Yawn..."

I was most impressed with Ge Fei at the time, as she was the one who could partner a guy in mixed doubles and win loads of trophies too.  She was pretty much installed as my most impressive female player until Gao Ling came along.  But even then, I don't think even Gao Ling had the unmistakable air of invincibility that Ge Fei and Gu Jun had during those days.

Before I close out this series I want to mention that we're living very enabled times.  The internet has transformed our daily lives, and will continue to encompass more and more aspects of our lives.  This holds true to the true blue badminton fan as well.  If you've ever missed a match you wanted to see, or, more importantly, you want to watch an evergreen player whom you've never seen before to see how they used to play the game, the internet is a fantastic resource.  The BadmintonCentral forum holds more badminton freaks in one place than anywhere I know, and Youtube has a great selection of clips of great players.  Badmintontorrents can point you the way to even more downloads of matches.

Agree or disagree with either my train of thoughts, or my choice of players?  Let me know in the comments!

See also:

• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Prelude
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 1
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 2
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 3
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Epilogue
  

This is a continuation of my previous posts on my Top 10 badminton players of all-time.  My previous posts include the Prelude, Part 1 and Part 2.

To continue:

4. Tony Gunawan

A true doubles specialist, and someone I consider to be pretty much the best doubles player ever.  Yes, I think he's better than Park Joo Bong, or Li Yongbo, or Kim Dong-moon, or whoever else you care to name.

He has won countless top tier competitions with a variety of partners in both men's and mixed doubles.  There are players who are just lucky to win titles after just one partner change, but fellow is so gamely he doesn't seem to mind who he wins titles with.  A testament, of course, to his playing abilities.

Gunawan is my poster boy for thinking doubles play.  His modus operandi seems to be to bewilder opponents.  Supremely experienced and seemingly impervious to pressure, if he weren't starting to age he's still be at the top of the world rankings.

And I say this with all due respect to Howard Bach: anyone who can win the World Championships partnering a player not among the world's elite deserves much adulation, praise and monetary rewards, and of course, a mention in my list.  I saw the World Championship men's doubles finals 2005, and remember being increasingly incredulous as Gunawan (then playing for the US) masterfully controlled the court while crafting opportunities for his partner Bach to use his only available weapon - his smash.  And this against his current partner Chandra Wijaya, at that time partnering Sigit Budiarto.  Wijaya and Budiarto are no chopped liver, I can assure you.  Gunawan/Bach's win gave the United States (the United States!) their first ever World Championship gold.  Even Malaysia hasn't got one of those, and Malaysia is a country where people on the street actually know what badminton is! 

(My dearest American friends, I apologize if this seems flippant.  Imagine if you will the Olympics Gold for men's basketball was won by Malaysia.  You'd be amazed and appreciative, but still incredulous.  And the fact remains that 99% of the American population does not know they have a Badminton World Championship gold medal.  I asked.)

I really liked that he and his best friend Chandra Wijaya have reunited a couple of years ago to tour the circuit entirely on their own (with sponsorship, I understand) to play, completely without pressure and to enjoy the game. 

3. Gao Ling

My favourite player to watch, bar none.  Gao Ling's the most jovial personality I've ever seen in my years of watching badminton matches.  She is very good-natured, and always has a self-deprecating smile for a missed shot or a good play. 

I really like watching her play.  Every other player on the court puts on a poker face, like going through the motions in another day at the office (Taufik Hidayat comes to mind.  He doesn't even seem to need to catch his breath).  Gao Ling is refreshingly different, she wears her feelings on her sleeve, and as I've mentioned in a very old post of mine, she soothes my soul, and makes badminton so much fun.

After Romance of the Three Kingdoms and the wuxia novels of Jin Yong, Gao Ling is the third most painful reminder of regret that I can't read Chinese.  Apparently the juiciest badminton gossips can be gleaned from Chinese tabloids, and while Google Translate enables me to read some of the stories, it takes an incredible amount of effort to understand the translation (and to avoid laughing too much).  I learned that she went out for a time with Chen Hong (I don't know why, he's always so sour-looking, such an antithesis to her very nature), another top Chinese men's singles shuttler, and when they broke off, there was a big commotion in the news.  I remember feeling sad, and hoped that this nice girl finds someone equally nice.

No, I'm not insane.  This is probably the closest I've got to idol worship. 

Oh, did I mention that she was also a winner?  I'm sorry, I just got carried away praising her demeanour that I forgot to mention that she is a brilliant doubles specialist in the mold of the formidable Ge Fei - able to play at the highest level in mixed and women's doubles.  She is fast, tenacious and has great anticipation.

Considered one of the best woman doubles player of all time, she has stood on the winners podium at the All-England for the last 8 years, either as women's doubles or mixed doubles champion, and sometimes both.  She was an Olympics gold medal winner in 2000 and 2004 in mixed doubles, 4 time World Championship winner and countless other titles.

See?  Nice fun-loving people don't always finish last.

As a bonus, check out one of the longest badminton rallies I've seen, featuring (who else?) Gao Ling.

2. Taufik Hidayat

The world's most innately talented badminton player.  On pure talent alone, I think this chap beats all.  A precocious teenager when he burst onto the scene, he is noted for this cool and calm demeanour, and a mastery of the game that is well beyond his years. 

I think his reputation has a gifted talent comes from his shot-making ability.  He is not known for his ability to retrieve shots, or his attacking ability (although he has that also).  I think it is his ability to improvise, to create a shot out of nothing, to attack when it seems like he is on the ropes.  Of course, the prime example of this is his world-famous backhand smash.

He is always dangerous.  He is the one player that the Chinese are looking out for.  He is the one that has the Malaysian players shake their heads when they find that he is in their draw.  Even now, when he is supposedly past his prime, he is still winning Super Series tournaments.  People tend to forget that he is only 28 this year, because he has been on the tour so long.

Before Lin Dan came along, he was the bad boy of badminton.  He went head-on against the Indonesian Badminton Federation when they changed his coach, and gave a walkover to Lin Dan in a semifinal match over a disputed line call (that match was less than 10 minutes old when he walked out).

But whatever tantrums he threw, he will still be remembered in my mind as the maestro.

He may not be my top badminton pick, but he is definitely my favourite player of all time.  I know I'm all the more fortunate in my life to have loved badminton, and to have watched Taufik Hidayat play.

1. Lin Dan

It's possible to quantify a player's success in sports.  No matter how passionately you believe a player to be good, you cannot argue with the record.  It's like how some are adamant that Michael Chang was one of the best and brightest young talents ever to emerge for tennis, but where are his trophies?  It's irrelevant just how gifted a player is if he doesn't have anything to show for it.

No matter what your feelings are for Lin Dan, there are a couple of things that cannot be denied:

1. World No 1 from 2004 for an almost consecutive period of 4 years.  Not an easy feat in the modern game (Chong Wei was very briefly No 1 in 2006 - something like 5 minutes, I think).  I can't think of anyone who dominated the sport so thoroughly since Rudy Hartono.
2. Including singles and team events, he won 6 titles in 2004, 4 titles in 2005, 8 titles in 2006, 7 titles in 2007 and 4 titles in 2008 (even though he was resting for almost 4 months after his Olympics gold!).  And that's not including the times he came second.  Oh, and by titles, I mean Super Series and Grand Prix titles, not domestic or satellite tournament titles, ok?

Who cares if he had a bust-up with his coach, or that he was a sore loser during the awards ceremony after losing the 2006 Malaysian Open final?  So what if Taufik pronounced him as 'arrogant'?  Lin Dan is virtually unbeatable, and have been for the longest time.  At 26, he still has at least 2 years of top flight badminton in him (Han Jian was still winning titles at 29, Gade at 32).

His domination of the game seems so effortless and total.  After winning the Beijing Olympics gold, he was not playing (I'm tempted to say enjoying his win) for almost 4 months before coming back to the Super Series tour playing in the China Open, and promptly won it.

Apparently he's good looking too, enough to attract the leggy beauty Xie Xingfang, a former World No 1 Chinese female singles shuttler, and countless screaming, hysterical fans.

I can't help but draw some parallels between Lin Dan's achievements with those of Roger Federer's and Tiger Wood's, but bearing in mind that badminton is more physically intensive than tennis (I don't think I want to compare the physical intensity between badminton and golf.  If you have any doubts, please buy a TV).

The fact that Chong Wei dispatched Peter Gade with such authority in the BWF Super Series Masters Finals in Sabah in Dec 2008 seemed to underline the fact: No matter how devastating Chong Wei may seem, the world knows there's still one other who is even better.

My top badminton player pick is a champion of champions.

p.s. I must say though, that his nickname, 'Super Dan', has got to be one of the stupidest nicknames for a top athlete I have ever had the misfortune of hearing.  I mean, come on!  I'm sure it translates well in Chinese, but in English it sounds like a washing detergent.

That's it!  This is my Top 10 badminton players of all-time.  There's still an Epilogue to this series, where I pick the ones that almost made it to the list.  That's coming tomorrow.

See also:

• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Prelude
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 1
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 2
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 3
  
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Epilogue

This is a continuation of my previous posts on my Top 10 badminton players of all-time.  My previous posts include the Prelude, and Part 1.

To continue:

7. Zhang Ning

China has produced a lot of top women shuttlers, and while Gong Zhichao is pretty damn impressive (I once read an interview where Gong Zhichao described her training - believe you me, I got tired just reading it), it is Zhang Ning that I ended up choosing in my list.  To me, she exemplifies single-minded determination.  "The Miracle" (a moniker given to her by coach Li Yongbo) won her first title at 28, an age that is closer to retirement for than it is for starting on a journey of world dominance.  But start it she did.  A year later she captured the biggest prize in all badminton - the Athens 2004 women's singles gold. 

The quest to capture the Athens gold reads like a really sweet kungfu revenge epic.  The woman she beat in the Athens final was Mia Audina, to whom she lost 10 years before, costing China the Uber Cup.  At the back of my mind I imagine the broken-hearted Zhang Ning running miles of steps up to a badminton training monastery with buckets of water on her back as penance after the loss, vowing to train harder and to come up tops next time both of them crossed swords.

Talk about getting the monkey off your back. 

Zhang Ning's fantastic play and successful defense of her Olympics Women's singles gold in Beijing 2008 at 33 years of age (setting the record yet again for the oldest women's singles gold medal winner) was one of badminton's most magical moments of all-time.  Pure inspiration.

6. Peter Høeg Gade

The great Danish powerhouse, Peter Gade has seemingly played forever.  He is a legend not just in Europe (he won the Copenhagen Masters in his home soil for a staggering 9 times - his ninth was bagged just 4 days ago at the time of writing), but in the world as well, having won international titles since 1994 when he was just 18.  A fantastic talent, he is a very clever and deceptive player.  At 33, he is still World Number 5, which is a testament to his staying power.  Will he be mentioned in the same breath as the great Morten Frost?  Yes.

His playing style is a mixture of offensive play with guileful courtcraft.  Players need to be on their toes with this chap as he can run opponents ragged.  As he gets older his play is more focused on tactics than pure powerplay, but no less interesting to watch.

Not only is Gade a great player, he is a very friendly and gracious fellow, one of the more popular players on the circuit.  This comes through when the media interviews him after the match.

(Which, by the way, is very perplexing to me - players are shepherded to a mic and an interviewer immediately after winning a match, and they are still dripping with sweat, catching their breaths.  Can't they wait?  Sorry, I digress.)

World badminton is ruled by Asian players nowadays, and the tremendous focus it receives in the East is something the European players are not familiar with in their homelands, as badminton is not in the top echelon of their favourite sports.  Which is a shame, as players like Gade constantly demonstrate - they have fantastic players who dazzle in the world stage.

And Gade has dazzled more than most.  

5. Susi Susanti

My all-time favourite woman singles shuttler.  My dad and I used to call her 'Rubber Band', as she bounces around the court.  Her court coverage was pretty amazing. 

I remember her as an all-conquering badminton femme fatale, who very seldom lost the matches I actually watch her play.  Her closest rival when I was watching her was Ye Zhaoying, and although Zhaoying was pretty mighty herself, it seemed to me Susi always had the upper hand.

Susi has an idiocyncratic tendency -  she tended to do these front splits when she failed to retrieve an out-of-reach shot.  Every time that happened I felt like clapping my hands. (Before you ask, no, the splits are not the reason she's in this list.)

I have another vivid memory of her announcing her engagement to Alan Budi Kusuma shortly after winning the first ever Olympics badminton women's singles gold medal.  I remember thinking that while Alan was good, he was not nearly one of the best, and he wasn't even the best in the Indonesian team at the time.  But strangely he managed to win his men's singles gold, and I suppose that made them a good pair.  Shrug.

Strange things surface to the fore when you're digging your memories.

The last 4 in the Top 10 coming up!

See also:

• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Prelude
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 1
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 2
  
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 3
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Epilogue

As mentioned in my prelude, here is the countdown of my top badminton players of all-time.

To start it off:

10. Yang Yang

One of my first memories of enthralling badminton battles involved this Chinese maestro.  Incredibly skilful, his steady play sustained his grip as the world's best in the 80s.  His matches with Morten Frost are classics of the game.  And since I'm going completely out on a limb now anyway, I might as well say that his rivalry with Frost pretty much defined that particular period of world badminton.

(If you're not sure, Yang Yang's the guy with the shorts.  And yes, he used to be much younger in his playing days).

9. Lee Chong Wei

The best singles shuttler Malaysia has produced thus far.  No doubt the product of decades of cutting-edge badminton training distilled from the countless elite coaches Malaysia has employed over the years, he is still retains the undeniably Malaysian trait: inability to overcome the psychological barrier to victory.

I've expounded before on the importance of the mental capacity to actually achieve greatness, and to his credit he has been largely successful when he's not cowed by more decorated opponents (read: Lin Dan).  But he can do so much more.

Foo Kok Keong, a Malaysian stalwart from the 90s, had that persistence and mental toughness, but he didn't have the skillset.   Kok Keong has exactly the thing Chong Wei lacks.

Let not my criticism blind you to the fact: I admire the Chong Wei.  I'm a fan, no doubt about that.  But as I said before, I love badminton, I love our players, but they break my heart every time.

Could it be that Malaysians simply expect too much from their players?  Are we unreasonable to expect trophies after trophies?  Are the public simply nuts to want Chong Wei be a name mothers frighten their badminton-playing children into obedience, like the way they do with the boogeyman (and nowadays, Michael Jackson)? 

There is nothing immediately characteristic about his play - he's a excellent all-rounder, a fantastic retriever with great court coverage.  However, he seldom attacks, prefers to run his opponents around rather than to go for the kill.  He sometimes does this to such an extreme that I feel like tearing my hair out.  This is because when he does attack, he is irresistible.

World Number 1 he may be at present, but nobody who watches badminton closely believes he is the true No 1.  Not unless he manages to do justice to his superior fitness and technical ability and stop losing games he should comfortably win.

8. Markis Kido/Hendra Setiawan

Of all the badminton events where the style of play have evolved over the years, the men's and women's doubles seems to have been affected the most.  The game used to be characterized with frequent smashes and brilliant defenses.  Now, the game is miles quicker, more drives and the player in front of the net is a more tactical player than ever before.

Of all the 'new' pairs out in the world, this young Indonesian pairing is by far the most interesting, lethal and, wait for it, fun to watch.

I don't care that they are not winning at the moment.  We're talking about the reigning World Champions and the holders of the Olympics Gold in 2008, a pair that was formidable before 2008, and will continue to hover at the top of the rankings in 2009.

Kido is the standard power player who can actually play at the net.  Setiawan plays sometimes like he's from another planet - the sort of shots that he can improvise sometimes defy belief.  When I watch Setiawan, I'm reminded of a football freestyler - a skilful ball player who can do things with the ball that you've never seen before (go check out Youtube if you don't know what a freestyler is). 

The only other pair that I think can generate such excitement of play is Koo Kien Keat/Tan Boon Heong.  There is only one difference between the two pairs: you can believe Kido/Setiawan will win titles, and that's why they are here.

Coming up tomorrow, more players down the list!

See also:

• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Prelude
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 1
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 2
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 3
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Epilogue
  

I've watched badminton for many years.  I love the sport and like a lot of diehard badminton freaks, lament the lack of exposure and general excitement from the public at large for this seriously entertaining game.  I love to watch other racquet games too, but if you ask me, for the excitement factor, nothing beats badminton.

Of course over the years I developed fondness for more than a few players for a variety of reasons.  Here's my attempt at recording these feelings down.  This, then, is a list of my favourite badminton players of all time.

Admittedly the 'All-Time' tag is a little bit pretentious.  Who's to say my list wouldn't change next month?  Or even next week?  Well, I'll cross the bridge when I come to it.  Consider this as the All-Time list... so far.

A couple of caveats.  I'm 31, so I'm not what you'd say an old hand.  I've never really watched Liem Swie King, Rudy Hartono, Eddy Chong.  I can't even say I remember watching Han Jian or even Misbun Sidek play.  Some may say these evergreens are the true legends, and I agree - anyone who has played the game so many years ago and are still held in high esteem must have done something to achieve this type of immortality.

However, since I cannot include people I can't remember watching into a list of my favourites, they are not represented here.  I would also argue that the game has evolved since the heydays of the game, when shuttle taps at the net and frenzied drive exchanges are not so common.  The game as it stands now is much more physical, quick and exciting, and as good as they are, I doubt the giants of yesteryear can play with the giants of today.

Please note that this list is completely subjective, irrational and emotional, and is not backed by any scientific or empirical evidence. 

This will be a multi-part posting, as I think the whole thing would be too long for a single post.

With that out of the way, let's begin. 

Tomorrow.

See also:

• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Prelude
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 1
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 2
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Part 3
• My Top 10 Badminton Players of All-Time - Epilogue

Readers of this blog know that I'm a huge fan of Koo Kien Keat and Tan Boon Heong, and while I'm critical of their recent performances, I'm proud of their achievements and their potential.

But in my accidental foray into Youtube today, I found this clip:

I quote from the About box of the video:

This is from the 3rd and deciding game of the Mens Doubles QF at the 2007 French Open Badminton.
The clip starts with a long and hard-fought rally.

Finally, Japan's Tadashi Ohtsuka & Keita Masuda win the point when Malaysia's Tan Boon Heong's drop hits the net and falls back into the Malaysian side of the court.

Notice (at 0:35) how Koo Kien Keat (Malaysia) steps forward and pushes the dead shuttle to the Japanese side for the next serve. (Returning the shuttle to the other side is the usual thing to do after losing a point.)
Importantly, it means that the Malaysians knew that the shuttle had failed to cross over to the Japanese side and that being so, they had lost the point and the serve to the Japanese.

Then comes the shocker of a decision by the umpire - he gestures that Malaysia had won the point. The Japanese can't believe it!

Bizarrely enough, the service judge is the one who contends that the shuttle fell into the Japanese side, although the action happened closer to the umpire.

What follows is simply shameful - and I can't believe that any Malaysian would actually do this.

Even as the Japanese duo are pleading their case, the Malaysian duo shamelessly walks away, when all they needed to do was acknowledge the wrong call.

If I were told this I simply wouldn't believe it. But the video clearly shows them guilty of the charge.

Malaysians may not be the best in sports, but if there's one thing that should define us it's our sportsmanship. This is not acceptable behaviour! There would be no glory in winning something mired in controversy, and this is the worse kind of controversy - because the replay shows you're a scam!

Now I know the players have been told never to question the decisions of the match officials, especially if it goes against your opponent and your opponent is objecting the decision until he's blue in the face. But come on! That rule is for dodgy line calls and misjudged top-of-the-tape shuttle taps. Definitely not for obvious errors like that!

You're both above that. Right?

No?

Damn I'm embarrassed.

We need a nicely produced, daily updated website that focuses primarily on badminton content. Something that has BBC Sports (or whatever online sports daily you prefer)-like quality that immediately exudes an air of quality, timeliness, accuracy and opinions that you can rely on and trust.

It's so difficult to get a nice roundup of badminton tournament updates. We can get live scores, tournament match-up and draws, results, but they are lifeless stats. There is a very vibrant forum community in Badminton Central, but while it is informative and (generally) friendly, it's not the proper place to get results, and match analysis. It's also prone to partisan support from member majority (typically vocal Malaysians, I understand).

There are no other dedicated websites of note. Badzine.info is updated, but doesn't have a lot of news content. I suspect the Chinese daily has a lot of info, but those of us who don't read Chinese is screwed. Google Translate makes the badminton stories featured in the dailies make me laugh so hard!

So, we don't have BBC Sports-like coverage of badminton. Anyone want to band together to create a badminton web-zine/blog style content that aims to consolidate all this information in a single, easy-to-use site, with a focus on a country-neutral, English language content for the world's consumption? A group of opinionated, and passionate fans with a strong command of English, preferably experienced players at national/international levels, ought to do it as we start out.

Sports commentators, in my opinion, occupy a very important position in the hierarchy of the full sports broadcasting spectrum. At one end of the spectrum are the sporting personality themselves, the athletes we plonk ourselves in front of our TV sets to watch. At the other end are the viewers, who do not have the luxury of time or place to be at the scene of the action. So sports commentators bridge this gap.

Normally the commentators simply vocalize the action we are seeing on the TV. The better ones backfill the viewers with information pertinent to the matches being run at the time of the broadcast. The elite few make the whole proceeding interesting by peppering commentary with interesting anecdotes of incidences that occurred on the floor outside of the cameras, and providing insight that maybe even the live audience members do not know.

So I was watching the Hongkong Open 2007 Badminton Super Series event (the website is crap, btw) for the first time since the tournament started, and had the pleasure of two gentlemen (native English speakers, I gather, and I didn't really concentrate so I couldn't place their accent. One of them may be Danish - I'll explain why later) for live commentary. I don't know their names and, since they never bothered to really introduce themselves semi-regularly for the duration, I didn't care.

What I did care, though, was the quality of the commentary. From the onset it was clear these two were no Gillian Clark (the best badminton commentator, period). Before every match, when the players are moving onto the court and warming up, there was no witty repartee, no background on previous matches played (today was the semis), no nothing. Fine, I thought. I don't need idle banter if prematch analysis isn't available.

The real surprise was during the Lee Chong Wei and Kenneth Jonassen match. One of the chaps, who clearly didn't come prepared, repeatedly called Chong Wei 'Chong Chee Wei.'

"What makes Chong Chee Wei so deadly is the speed of his play."

"Great point for Chong Chee Wei."

"Chong Chee Wei is so handsome." (No, I made that one up).

The point was, it was such an outward display of disrespect to the player on the court, and a disservice to all the viewers everywhere. If you're going to be a commentator, and representing the action on court, you have the responsibility to know your stuff. You're not a native Malaysian? Then spend the time to learn up the names at least! If you couldn't pronounce the names accurately to the perfect pitch required that's okay, but to mangle a name like that really shows how poor some commentators could be.

Hell, I'm neither a native English speaker nor a commentator, but I take the time to learn up the nuances of pronouncing names of Western players. Why shouldn't you, as a commentator, take the trouble?

The irony is, they took the time to talk about how to pronounce Jonassen's name! One of them (the one I presumed to be Danish, as the other commentator specifically asked this one how to pronounce Kenneth's name) did clear up a long standing question on whether it was Peter-Gayd or Peter Ga-der (it's Ga-der), and noted that the Danes do not pronounce the 'h' in Kenneth (therefore it's Ken-net).

How conscientious of them.

See, the difference is, these commentators are *there* at the scene of the action. As journalists, they have access to the players, coaches, other members of the media. Why couldn't they get a list of matches they will be commentating, walk up to the respective teams' camps, talk to them and ask them to pronounce the names they couldn't? Learn up phonetics notation (the ones you see in dictionaries), and make the effort! Gillian Clark is English, and never too proud to put in the effort to learn up the names - even the tough Chinese ones that give even me the creeps. That's professionalism, boys.

If ever I become a sports commentator (that is to say, when I dream tonight), I vow to pronounce any name properly, and will not have any smartass blogger complain about my pronunciation in some silly blog somewhere.

So Koo Kien Keat and Tan Boon Heong are at the pinnacle of their sport. Wonderful. I hope they remember the legacy of being World No. 1 in Malaysia. The legacy of underachievement. I hope they realize it, and aim to break the rot.

Rashid was for a short time World No. 1. So was Roslin. Lee Chong Wei. None of them held onto the top spot for very long. It's as though they thought that achieving the No. 1 position was a goal, like someone passing the tape at a marathon finish line. Their standard of badminton at the point of reaching No. 1 took a dive, and none of them made it back up. It was also telling that none of them held to the No. 1 spot for very long either.

Will KKK-TBH follow in their footsteps? Malaysian badminton players have notoriously weak mental strength. Can they take the heat of being the pair everyone wants to scalp?

Not reading the newspapers regularly does have its disadvantages. I didn't know about the rift between the pair when the story broke - someone mentioned it to me. I was surprised, but it was not unexpected. When you get poor results.

I'm a very vocal critic of our badminton team. But I believe that KKK is probably the world's most potent doubles player at present, second only to the incomparable Tony Gunawan. KKK is a better player than TBH. But so what? The pair is only as good as the pairing forged, not on the individual player. KKK has to be matured about the nature of their pairing, and put in the work required to make it work, just like anyone would have to put in the work to make any relationship work.

That's not to say TBH has nothing to do. KKK has a right to expect a higher standard of play from him, and the way to show he is serious is to improve his game. He's not that shabby, but to be demanded to be even better speaks volumes about their ability.

It's good they got over the supposed 'rift' quickly, and won the Macau Open (though I must say they won it by the skin of their teeth).

So. World No. 1. What next? They have to stay there.

Here's what they have to do. Remember their hunger when they first came onto the scene. Hungry and with a point to prove. To play without pressure and with the intense desire to win, and the willingness to work together to do it.

They've proven it and now risen to the top. Remember that they have another point to prove now - that they are here to stay. Perched at the summit.

I'm really fed up with what I'm reading these days on the Worlds. We're all fired up for this meet, and when things don't go according to plan, all the fingers are drawn up like pistols from holsters in an old western flick. I'm pissed in particular about the roasting the media is giving Boon Heong - articles like this and this really rile me up. I think it's blatantly unfair to single him out, and here's why.

Mens doubles, it may surprise some to know, is a team event, and the failure or success of the team is borne by the all the members of the team.

So Boon Heong made some mistakes. So? In the quarters against the Japanese they spent a lot of effort attacking the weaker Ikeda, presumable because he makes a lot of mistakes too. But oh, wait... the Japanese won anyway, didn't they?

Mens doubles is a *team* event, and should be treated as such. TBH-KKK failed, and they failed as a team.

The badminton team should put up a united front to the public. Not because Boon Heong 'choked on crucial points'! Take these 'reasons' offline! Debate and thresh it out behind the glare of publicity. Everyone knows what happened, we bloody hell watched it. There's no need to rub his face in - the bloke's been through enough himself, and he doesn't need it being plastered all over the freaking media reminding everyone and his dog that the whole country's disappointed because of him. Which isn't true at all.

What good do you think this sort of coverage will possible bring to Boon Heong? That he's inferior to KKK? That he has a lot to learn? Where the hell were the media when KKK was show-ponying in the local circuit tournaments - was KKK dragged through mud in public? Again, what good would come of it? How would TBH feel now that KKK goes on record saying this defeat 'really hurt'?

KKK-TBH is still a good pairing. All this media attention is focused on the wrong things, and will affect the morale of the team unnecessarily. Or worse, affect their budding relationship and the all important on-court chemistry. We as fans have a right to hope for the stars, but let's taper with down with some reality checks and good old fashioned sensibility.

TBH, pick yourself up! Your country still needs you.

Okay, they won again. I'm a little more impressed. I'm sure others will cover the men's doubles finals in the Swiss Open, so I'll be content so simply say that I was cheering for Koo Kien Keat and Tan Boon Heong the whole way.

I wanted to talk about yesterday, when I turned on the TV to catch the action, and lo and behold I was surprised to see that their opponents were the formidable Indonesian/US pairing of Chandra Wijaya and Tony Gunawan (whom I think has to be one of the best doubles players ever). Now understand that in the papers yesterday morning KKK-TBH was supposed to meet Fu Haifeng and Cai Yun - a prospect I didn't want to miss. A rematch so quickly after defeating them in the All England? Mouth-watering.

So imagine my surprise at finding that they are not playing the Chinese world champs. TheStar has never let me down before. Hrmph. Just when I thought of settling down to watch this unexpected matchup, Gillian Clark (who is the best badminton commentator at present, although she does repeat herself quite often) said that KKK-TBH had already beaten the Chinese pair enroute to the semi-fnals.

Huh?

I wasn't expecting this news. What, the Chinese were dispatched without much fanfare? What is this? I'm not used to Malaysians beating world champs like they were qualifiers, especially after Malaysians win major tournaments. Their mental strength was never this dependable.

The last Malaysian to win the All England disappeared from the radar - like Chinese metropolis towns disappearing from satellite views because of air pollution.

So anyway, while I sat there stunned that they've whacked the Chinese, the game started. The Indonesians were clearly onto their game. Although Wijaya-Gunawan lost the first game, they came back in the second and completely closed the boys out with vicious attacks. Any shuttles lifted were quickly dealt with, especially by Chandra Wijaya who was simply mesmerizing.

I had thought the Malaysians have clearly ridden their luck for as long as they could have hoped, and would fade out as the Indonesians seemed have figured them out. The third game was a washout, but surprisingly it was the Malaysians who did all the washing. Gillian Clark commented at one point in the third game, "What happened to the Indonesians?" Let me enlighten you, Jill. Rexy Mainaiky happened. Even I could tell you what he told the boys in the third game interval: "Keep the bloody shuttle low."

If anyone had a recording of the match, the second and the third game the Malaysians played were completely different. Gunawan and Wijaya could not smash at all, and they were clearly unstuck at the speeds the shuttles were being sent back just above the net. That was tactical play at its best.

It was a fantastic semi-final, all told. The boys deserved to go to the finals. After Fu Haifeng-Cai Yun and Wijaya-Gunawan, who else could stand up to them? Only themselves - will their mental strength carry them through?

As I said in a post last week after their win at All England, the boys have to keep their heads low. They are clearly a first in Malaysia in that they can continue winning and show no fear at their opponents, whoever they may be. I'd shake their hands and pat their backs if I see them. But please, let's hope the media plays it straight and keeps it level. They are still young, have a long way to go. I hope they don't turn into the Cheah Soon Kit-Soo Beng Kiang or Cheah Soon Kit-Chong Tan Fook partnerships.

Well done, Swiss Open men's doubles champions. Winning 3 out of the 4 Super Series tournaments and being the Asian Games champions - all within 6 months is nothing to be sneezed at.

But let us not feed their egos too much - they have a job to do, which is to keep us smiling and the flag flying high.

My rants about Malaysian players have been well documented (here that is). I've always complained about the lack of mental strength for all our players when it comes to reaching for the stars.

So Koo Kien Kiet and Tan Boon Heong has won the freaking thing. I'm not about the jump the bandwagon and start singing their praises, oh no. I've been bitten too many times in the past to fall for that. I remember the sort of joyous celebratory chants we were all participating in when we won Thomas Cup back in 92, when Hafiz Hashim won All England in 2003, when Chong Tan Fook and Lee Wan Wah reached the finals in 2004, and how Lee Chong Wei is our next saviour, yadda yadda yadda. All the talk about a renaissance since 92 has been nothing but just that: talk.

I've heard it all before!

I mean, come on. We're talking about a nation where the national badminton association let Li Mao, arguably the best thing to happen to Lee Chong Wei, go because of bloody administrative red tape! So now we have to keep an extra eye out for Lee Hyun Il because Li Mao happens to know the whole Malaysian singles setup backwards. Not smart.

I've always believed that the Malaysian press has a hand in causing all the problems in Malaysian badminton. When Hafiz won, for instance, there was this disproportionate amount of media coverage on him, exulting him as one of our brightest stars in badminton since the Jurassic period, covering his intent on keeping himself 'humble' by enlisting in the local police force, etc, etc. I'd imagine him knowing that the whole nation is simply lapping up his every move may not have done his young mind any good.

So stop the crazy adulation! Yes, give them their due - they are a great pair to watch, and incredibly hungry for success. Yes, tell em to go kick more ass. But let's not forget there are other badminton players out there.

I will say that this pair is the closest we've come to a renaissance - together for 6 months and winning 3 of the 5 tournaments they played so far. Precocious and supremely confident, we'll see if their winning ways will strengthen their minds and self-believe, or will it feed into their egos and cause their downfall (in which case we just add another pair of names to our list of wanna-be heroes).

And I will also say Rexy is doing a brilliant job. Brilliant.

I just realized that I didn't really close out the story. I should have mentioned that China, the near-invincible China, has retained the Thomas Cup by beating Denmark in the Thomas Cup Finals. I saw the third match, which was the second singles, and well, it's not the typical down-the-wire match that usually happens between Chun Lai and Jonassen, but it was entertaining nonetheless.

It is an expected victory. The Great Wall of China remains unbreached.

I'm excited about the World Championships coming up.