Chai/Hong have the skills, speed, movements, power but they should employ more varied tactical plays, they should learn the very lessons from other top pairs such as their current opponent LYD/YYS, Ahsan/Setiawan, or even Fu HF/Zhang Nan...somehow Chai in particular is showing he hasn't learned yet.
It's a good day for IND badminton fans as their players scoop two titles in singles department. Second title of SS circuit for Saina in this year after AUS Open SS last June, she disposed the teenager with her experience particularly at critical moment. What a breakthrough by Indian youngster Srikanth to eliminate great player in front of his opponent homesoil and grabbed first ever SSP title! Fresh face added as SS winner now after Chou Tien Chen won French SS last month, interesting fact. Who's next? Host CHN must satisfy with two titles, XD and WD. These two matches were thrilling and high intensity, good final match to watch. Last match, KOR jewel Lee YD/Yoo YS defended their last year title to beat home pair Chai B/Hong W, this CHN pair produced uncharateristic errors frequently, the more calm KOR pair gained momentum after trade points at 14-14 position in game 2.
Come to think of it, I'm glad Lin Dan didn't 'choose' to lose to JOJ or CTC and I'm sure he won't mind losing to the young up-and-comer Srikanth. Otherwise, the storyline would be very different, with some people claiming JOJ is his nemesis or CTC is the next/new LCW. Just as luckily, Lin Dan's opponent in the final wasn't Chen Long. If it were and he lost to his teammate in this manner, you can imagine what certain people would charge him with, eg that he's shortchanging the paying spectators, that's he's not putting in decent effort, that they aren't playing by the rules, poor sportsmanship, or worse, claim it's match-fixing. Indeed, it's extremely tough being a CHN player, some people don't treat them as human, and can only accept one outcome,i.e. their defeats to non-CHN players.
Next week, another 5 players at the HK Open SS , possibly one or two repeat cases , will get a shot at beating 'this' Lin Dan. Once more, golden opportunities for the lucky ones.
Good job for Srikanth. His net shots were excellent. On the other hand, I haven't seen LD playing this bad for some time. I almost stopped watching it when he kept making unforced errors in the second set. I was like "what the hell are you doing!?!"
He has no chance of qualifying. When he withdrew from France, he also lost his last realistic chance to qualify. Even back to back wins at China and HK Opens wouldn't be enough.
im pretty sure noones disputing that credit is due to srikanth. what is at issue is the amount of credit due. and sorry but ur view that its always the case that 'winner takes all' is puerile. u do take the winnings and the title, but its certainly not all of it, including the intangible aspects like respect etc. if he beats an underpar lin dan for any reason, he cannot say with a clear conscience that hes better than lin dan as a player. he was no doubt better on the day, but to say he 'takes it all' is going too far.
It's embarrassing but not the end of the world. World Champion, Olympics, TC and SC are the important ones. Having said that, it shows concern. Bring back Sun Jun as coach!
I just counter-checked, he is in the HK Open SS draw http://www.tournamentsoftware.com/sport/draw.aspx?id=4BC97B56-47EC-4612-9850-455FB7F5DA5B&draw=2
What is a biet disquieting is CL who seems to have the habit of loosing to lesser opponents, from time to time. But it is nice to see some variety
If it's as you've said, then I'm hoping against hope. Thanks to CTC for damaging his knee at the French Open, no wonder Lin Dan made an effort to beat CTC again here.
I think its a concern now, Lin dan already 31 years old, and now Chen long is not winning tournament consistently, and the younger players of China team , are not going up fast challenging Wang Zhengming and Tian Hou Wei, for a place... China badminton for Single real Concern . Same apply to China Mens Double.. Qiu Zi han and Liu Xiao long , not improving as expected, the badminton of China is declining !
I suppose Lin Dan doesn't really need Sun Jun, or anyone for that matter, as his coach, it's Chen Long who will benefit greatly for having Sun Jun coaching him. Yeah, Li Yongbo would do well to enlist Sun Jun as one of his national coaches, I'm all for it.
