But that was when Indonesia already had the bidding for individual sponsorships, not all players will have picked a lower offer just because the owner is a former player, surely...? They tried to get into the market here as well, I saw a few guy with their stuff (who would've gotten smaller contracts with all other brands), and theyve vanished completely since. I'm guessing an overambitious, overconfident marketing guy in charge who had no actual idea about the European (badminton) market. Wouldn't be the first...(anyone remember adidas...? )
HKV at 33 is still not showing any signs of slowing down, in fact, he's been playing his best badminton past 30 until now. Hats off to HKV.
Lower ranked players , without any pressure under their shoulders , playing freely and giving everything they have to take the game 1 while the seeded players come back stronger with experience at hands in the next two games.
HKV has played a very similar amount of matches as CTC....so its not really about experience In this case, the more consistent player won. In the case of LD vs NTM, the one with more discipline who didnt let himself be pushed to his limit, who ran far less. In the case of SK, he managed to just barely get a hold of his nerves. Not so much a matter of experience showing, more the overall better player pulling through. Another reason to not adopt the shitty 11 points/bo5 games system bwf proposed btw.
Both very motivated, but kept it very amiable imop. No shouts into their opponent's face that I witnessed. HKV even apologized for winning challenges (unnecessary but a nice touch nonetheless). Too bad he couldnt keep the quality high at the very end, would've been nice to see a closer finish and maybe even a few more long rallies
My impression of the arena is that it was slow and with no significant drift today. There were not that many people, maybe 30-40% full at most. The security control was not so strict as I feared so I could bring a waterbottle and bananas etc with no problem. The atmosphere was nice and not too noisy but I was annoyed at some guy who had a bell when cheering for the Swiss players though . Also worth to know: everything is expensive in Switzerland so think twice before you ever go here. Some selected impressions of the matches: Ellis/Langridge performed well, their opponents never had a chance. Lee Cheuk Yiu smashed his way past Huang Yuxiang, was nice to watch if you are a fan of smashes like me CL did not look that convincing, he has great defence, precision and fitness but he played a bit too passively, may be troubled against a stronger opponent later on. Momota did as expected. Jonatan Christie had trouble to close out the match as usual and eventually won G2 21-19. TMN had a hard time to score winners against LD and when TMN began to tire the match was over, good effort though. Srikanth almost screwed up, looked nervous mostly. Nhat Nguyen played well, better than I expected so it was an entertaining match. NN defended well. Issara/Jongjit lost narrowly to Scotland pair, the match had many good rallies with agressive play and it was a massive joy for Scotland in the end, they converted their first and only matchpoint at 20-19 with a smash hitting the netcord and falling over tough luck for THA pair. Vittinghus played well, sad for him that he didn´t get a better draw.
Maybe he was testing the conditions for future matches. Seeing how his high risk shots might or might not work in this hall and tournament.
Seems like I do have psychic ability. One seeded player was ousted yesterday. SV lost to LKY. How far LKY can go?
the casualties begin for the post-lcw badminton nation players tonight as their real tests await them...
