Since Boonsak was the surprise winner in MS, I did a quick calculations on the new rankings on this coming Thursday. new ranking(current ranking) 1(1) LD 2(3) CJ 3(6) CY 4(2) BCL (who skipped SO) 5(4) Chen Hong 6(5) LCW 7(7) Gade 8(8) KJ 9(11) Boonsak 10(9) Hafiz 11(10) Taufik Oh my god! Chinese players will occupy the top-5 spots. Is this unprecedented in both the men's categories (MS, MD)?
Congrats to Boonsak and Cai/Fu. Boonsak was really exemplary in this tournament. Chen Yu had no idea at all how to counter him. It was a great MD battle between Cai/Fu and Choong/Lee. You could say it was a tale of missed chances, but the longer the battle gets, it was always going to play into Cai/Fu's hands. Great effort and spirit too from Choong/Lee, unfortunately with lack of energy and speed at the tailend, comes mistakes. Goes to show that even in pt per rally format, the comeback trail is still open. Cai/Fu have improved their drive game (forcing MAS pair to lift more), and their defences held better after some changes to their defensive formation. It must be a relief winning a tournament after having missed many times since their World Championship victory.
cai/fu looked really fast... they really improved their speed and cai yun also improved big time... they beat CTF/LWW in the same fashion when they also beat TG/CW... their opponents have the chance to take away the second game yet they can't close it... in the third set, obviously, the game will belong to the younger and more energized pair...
Its still the old Choong/Lee we are looking at. They just didnt seems to have the solid mental strength to close the match, unlike KKK/TBH. Anyway just wanna give credit to their defense, its just out of this world!
What i think of aviva 2007 men's singles: boonsak was hot. chen yu has no answers Mixed doubles : sara lee let everyone down men's doubles: Most exciting match i've seen for a long time. the chinese got a little demoralised in the first 2 games when their strong smashes seemed to be easily returned by the malaysians. i think Fu needs more smash placement/deception instead of relying on brute force but well, cai/fu always does magic at the tightest moments... women doubles: zhang yawen's double-leg jump-smashes were an absolute pleasure to watch Women's singles: i've never seen XXF crumble like that. Even lin dan would find it hard to beat her 21-3.....lol OVerall, aviva 2007 was great and pleasurable to watch......except for some bad line calls during gade v chenyu match, as well as cai/fu vs gunawan/candra....we didn't even get a good camera angle Well.....lookin forward to s'pore open next year!
Congratulations A big THUMB UP for Boonsak. Congratulations! Superb performance. Keep up the good work.
The Malaysian team should have won the 3rd set. I don't think age is the main factor here. Too many unforce error.
I missed the first match and the first set of the women's singles. Anyway, I wasn't really paying that much attention to the women's singles matches. Zhang Ning could have sealed the second set when she was leading 19-17, only for Xie Xingfang to grab the last 4 points of the second set. From then on, it was a one-sided affair, with Zhang Ning taking the glory 21-3 in the rubber set. The mixed doubles was also one-sided surprisingly, most notably being Saralee's countless unforced errors in front of the net. The INA pair won it comfortably and it must be a relief for PBSI since this represents INA's first title in the Super Series. Singapore must be a good hunting ground for Flandy Limpele as he has already won two titles in a row, men's doubles last year and mixed doubles this year. Boonsak Ponsana also surprised everyone in the stadium by playing an attractive and aggresive game. We were mesmerized by his numerous cross-court smashes which Chen Yu simply had no answers to. At the end, Boonsak was quite comfortable in his first major win of his career, the Super Series title. Considering that the top 28 ranked men singles players are competing in Singapore this week, it really is a miracle that Boonsak eventually took the title. The last match of the day was always going to be the most entertaining and thrilling one. The MAS pair was quick to establish a quick lead in the first set and they took it 21-16 quite easily. The second set was tight and close till the end. Choong/Lee had two match points, only to surrender the set 22-24. What a waste indeed. They were trailing 1-4 point when they established another huge lead at 15-8. At this moment, they started the crumble. The lead shrank to 18-15 very quickly and that represented their last point in the match. Fu/Cai dominated the last few points and took the match 21-18. It was another suicidal collapse by the veteran MAS pair and Rexy must be fuming at them
See Chong/Tan thought it's All England again !!! We now know that Chong/Tan are the pair everyone wants to play in the finals....and guess what the reason is ???
Congrats to Fu/Cai for winning the Men's Doubles! ^^ I was there right smack in the stadium watching all the matches and I was cheering hard for them, the most exciting match that was on today was definetely the men's doubles! Just watch the news and Saralee seems to have a back-ache so thats why she couldn't perform on standard. Her partner was happy that despite the back injury they can still make it to the finals.
Both the MDs are champions Thank you for expressing this appreciative attitude. The match was sooooo...fantastic it didn't matter to me who won.I'm happy for cy/fhf for winning their first title this year after such a long drought.And ctf/lww, you guys are cool and in smashing form. welcome back!Maybe next time, take a gamble and let go of G2 so you have sufficient energy to go all out in G3.
It's fatigue setting in.When that happens, even easy shots go wrong. I don't think Rexy would be fuming. I think he would be proud of them. It's so good to see them playing fantastic again.
Congratulation to Boonsak!! Good to see a talented player like him finally get his big break after years of trying hard to win a title.He is too good for Chen Yu today. Alttough Chen Yu also played well today, he has no answer to Boonsak attack and deceptive strokes. Boonsak is so fast and agile on court today. Fantastic court coverage and he altered his defence and attack superbly. Simply fantastic!! As for Lee/Chong, it was a pity they missed the chance but they played very well!! They fought their heart out before they went down. They have shown that they can still challenge titles but they still need to tighten their grip at crucial moments. In fact, they dominated the game most of the time. Skill wise they have an upper hand against the Chinese pair. Chinese pair is fit and more focus. They are very determine and has superb mental strength. They deserve the title. Lee/Chong won ABC and went into final in SO and they played so well. They deserve applauses and encouragements from Malaysian Fans not negative critics( constructive ctritics is alright). I am a die hard fan of Malaysian badminton team. I always think if we love to see them win we should voise constructive critics but lets not throw negative muds on the players. I think if they meet Fu/Chai again in IO or any other tournaments Lee/chong will still have an upper hand. If they can improve their focus like they have shown in ABC, Fu/Chai will not be able to escape defeat. The fact is, every body can see that Fu/Chai won by "escaping defeat" but not dominating their opponents like a champion. Nevertheless, a win is a win. This is a fact we must accept. And lets hope Fu/Chai ,kkk/Tan and other Malaysian pairs try harder next time. Malaysian men double is on the rise, every body can see this fact. They will win more title for sure, just a matter of time.
Just spoken with Rexy a while ago. He was not fuming with CTF/LWW and i disagree with those who said they lost focus and crumble under pressure. In fact they played well.. just that Fu/Cai changed strategy.. and keep forcing CTF and Wan wah into playing flat drives and jabs.. Chinese is faster in that terms and they prevail.
i don't think this is unprecedented, the INA team had something like 8 of the top 10 spots in MS in the 90s. but doubtless, it's still an amazing achievement.
It's strange too see Hafiz still hovering in top 10 even after lousy performance one after another, it shows how inconsistent the ranking system has been. As for the 4 top Chinese occupying the top spots, does it really matter? Even when Chen Yu was out of top 10, he was still capable of beating any of the top player! It's the "form" of the player that is going to make the difference. Boonsak peaked at the right moment and won the Singapore Open. Realisticly, only Lin Dan is hard to beat among the top 10 due to his consistency, the rest really depending on "full moon" or "half moon", "high tide" or "low tide"
