Take a look at LCW's ranking points here: http://tournamentsoftware.com/ranking/player.aspx?id=10181&player=107832 Only 10 tournaments are counted toward the ranking and since this is his 11th tournament, the tournament with the least points (Korea Open, 430) will be dropped out.
The most that he could get from the Macau Open is 3400 points. So if he chooses to play, it probably won't be because of the ranking points, IMO.
I think he will withdraw. Macau would be the insurance option if he had had 1st round exits in China and HK opens. Chong Wei said in the post match interview he's been on the circuit for 16years, he has two children and a wife and it's very tiring. We will just have to wait and see after the Olympics whether he will continue to play. He loves coming to HK.
That s good research. Yes, there s no reason now for him to play for ranking points. And as Cheung pointed out , Macau Open is more for ranking point insurance. No fan is likely to miss out on his absence because they are likely to have gone to HKO. If he has to honour his commitment to the organizers, he can do it with some promotional event like autograph session appearance. But he must withdraw from Macau Open so that those players in his draw will have the fair chance to fight it out, even from the first round. LCW must remember that if his ranking point is not going to improve by participating in a tournament, then he should not, otherwise he will be depriving another player of the opportunity to enter the main draw or just to participate in the qualifying rounds.
You make out like it's some moral duty of Lee Chong Wei to give up a place. It's nothing like that. It is a case of risk management. What point is there risking injury in a tournament that doesn't matter. It's pretty simple If he plays and wins, no questions asked. If he plays and injures himself, then fingers will point and say, "supposed to be preparing for olympics and then go and injure yourself in a worthless exercise" I do agree that he could do some promo event if required.
Lol... if anyone wants to talk about depriving lowly ranked players of opportunity, let's see in a few days time whether LD will do exactly that in Rio...
From reading the HK Open thread, [MENTION=98380]Sundis[/MENTION] mentioned perhaps LCW should be granted a wild card to the Dubai SS Finals. What do you think? On one hand, he's on a roll after winning 3 SS tournaments in a row. But on the other, he didn't participate for many months due to the ban. If he does get a wild card, he'll have a very good chance of winning it, having proved his comeback is for real. And not to worry about over playing, since there's 2 weeks to Dubai, and a few months to the next SS at AE in early Mar. He'll have lots of time to recover and train leading up to Rio in Aug.
If LCW, having won 3 SS, cannot qualify for the SSF, then I would say to BWF 'stick you tourney in your ...' As it makes no sense.
I think the SSF is very important to LCW's confidence on the court, and I think without it, come March in the AE, he'll be suffering from nerves again. I think he needs this entry to ensure he comes back confident.
He still has the Purple League to maintain match fitness and try to tune up areas of his game. This won't require travelling away from home unlike the Indian Badminton League. It's March onwards when things will become really interesting.
LCW confident is through the roof atm, beating CL in back to back tournament, I don't think he need anymore booster. At his age he really need to be selective with tournament entry and look after his body. What he need as can be seen on his HK final match is a good rest. Notice the tired face and huge strap on his shoulder? SSF is fix at Dubai until 2017 through some sponsorship deal with BWF. I am not a big fan of Dubai or any other oil rich middle east nation that pretend to look modern and liberal but underneath there is all sort of human right issue. They got the dough to give out generous prize money but I question the significant of winning a SSF in technically a non badminton nation, and especially for someone that has won it 3 times. I worked in Dubai once and I didn't see much local interest in badminton. Some rich expats might play among themselves in exclusive clubs. Foreign workers has no time nor the affordability. Does the real local emirates play the sport? I have no idea what they do beside going shopping and driving big cars. Heck I'm not even sure if they go to work at all. I'd rather see LCW back home resting and preparing for All England 2016. LCW don't need anymore ranking point to qualify for Rio which is his ultimate goal, plus as can be seen lately, LCW play better without the burden of carrying the No.1 ranking.
Oppss.. fact error.. LCW has actually won SSF 4 times. That is how insignificant SSF feels, no one give a damn!
Dubai hosts the event for it's own international profile (rather like Singapore and F1). In my view, I would take it because Superseries finals has had problems finding the sponsors and cash in other countries. But yeah, agree it seems like Chong Wei plays better without the burden of no.1. His tactical hope is to split Lin Dan and Chen Long so that both of those players meet each other in the quarter or semifinals. I think he'd rather play Chen Long than Lin Dan in the Olympics.
