not to make light of the situation, but those guards have already been rendered useless by distractions I hope everything goes well, dont terrorists have better things to target than one of the poorest international sports?
OK, prior to the "news flash", did it even cross your mind that Hyderabad was a dangerous place for badminton? You were probably happily going through the WC threads with nary a thought about safety issues. Now that this "news flash" has come out, you suddenly launch into the BWF and point fingers at them. It's not like they said "Hyderabad... yup, dangerous enough a venue. Let's endanger all the players' lives by making them play there". Don't you think they would have got some guarantees for safety before deciding on it? Do you think that when Kennedy went to Dallas in 1963, he had any inkling of what was going to happen? Do you consider Dallas a dangerous place? Think about 9-11, do you think all those who perished in the unfortunate incidents knew what was coming? Yet international sporting events still run like clockwork in the New York since then. Since there are murders and accidents everywhere, everyday, the world must be too dangerous a place for you. Perhaps you should insulate yourself in the safety of your home in case anything untoward might happen. Seriously.
For a great follower of cricket like me, when I heard the WC is held in India and hyderabad, the first thing that flashes across my mind is terrorist attacks. There has been some many bombings in India in the past few months it's not a joke. The australia davis cup team refuse to play there, the IPL was nearly not held there because of security issues ( it was moved to SA anyway cos of elections). The mumbai hostage thing etc etc.
Sorry, off-topic... you must be enjoying AUS's current position in the 4th Ashes Test. With a win imminent, this sets up an intriguing 5th Test at the Oval. ENG's batting has been woeful.
If i m not mistaken, the 2008 India Open was cancelled because of terrorist attack in Hyderabad........am i right...?
Latest : England withdraw the whole team from Hyderabad WC.............China Press Malaysia http://www.chinapress.com.my/breaking_new.asp?a=0810bkf10.txt
Yah haha... I can't believe England went into the test with 5 bowlers and Broad batting at 7.... England have a unhealthy obsession with Harmisson and hoping he can reclaim some kind of for he had in 04-05... And Bopara I feel is just not up to standard... sure he scored 3 centuries against the pretty woeful West Indies... but that is also after numerous dropped catches and chances. He is more appalling than Owais Shah for me and seems more mentally disintegrated by Warnes comments, which I totally agree with.
hope everything wil be running smoothly though. pray hard. btw, will the air cond be switch off as planned and talked before?
I find it a bit puzzling that England of all nations pulls out of the Championship... I am pretty sure there will be "terrorist threats" 2012 in London Olympics as well.. Do the UK fellows think everyone should not participate in their olympics then... If they feel that the organisation has not proper security they should raise that as an objection imop.. Life is full of risks.. just by taking the taxi back to the airport, they will take a risk.. Personally I cannot really respect their decision.. /Twobeer
By badminton standards this is really massive news in the UK i.e. it has actually made the news, in a fairly big way as well. If anything good has come out of this at least people may know that the badminton world champs exist and are actually taking place as it won't have got any coverage otherwise.
It's pretty sad that this is the first time Badminton has hit the mainstream news over here since the Olympics last year...
Clark and Nathan will surely miss their chance of being WC Champion although the MD competition seems to be the most competitive initially, until the WR1 of INA's Kido and Setiawan withdrew because of Kido's sickness.
British Withdrawal... With all due respects to English Team about the safety of their players, I wonder how are they going to deal with London Olympics in three years time. Do they expect to all terrorists have a heart change by then? They will be handling tens of thousands of athletes, staffs and many hundreds of fans entering their country. Anyway with British involvement in Iraq, Afghanistan etc. any place they go, they will remain big targets. :-( Anyway, let's hope this is another of those false alert and with Commonwealth Game just a year away, I am sure Indian security will not take any risk at all.
Hours ago I heard from our TV news that apparently there were personal threats supposedly against certain members of the England team. That perhaps was the main reason why England pulled out on the eve of this WC. "Better late than never" if indeed this was the case rather than regret if something really bad should happen. Security seems to be very tight at the badminton venue now as we get to see pictures not only of the courts inside the stadium but outside as well when visitors were thoroughly seached at the entrance and armed guards with dogs are stationed in the vicinity.
A message to terrorists reading this . A message to terrorists reading this: It's sad that our world has changed so much over the last 8 years or so. OK... to the terrorists it's War, War, War. But why should innocent and non-political people be targeted? Let's have some peace... chris@ccc .