Towel down/drink break exists now and is for player holding service. Any player can request towel/drink break from Umpire at any stage. Break is currently 90 second between first and second set, and 5 minutes between the second and third. The umpire can make these break mandatory and of fixed duration before the match for televised matches.
but what would happen with court wiping? surely players would just use court wipe request to towel down - these could be shorter breaks than a mandatory towel down break, and could also be used more regularly. an umpire can hardly say no since it's in the interests of safety.. difficult to see how they would manage timeouts when some are restricted and some aren't..
Yes you are correct, players have opportunity for these breaks, usually very short. Umpire still retains control though. As seem from previous macthes, umpires can issue command to continue if they think this is delibrate time wasting.
Given that China / Asia is seen as the main market for economic growth export etc in the coming years you would think that badminton would be ideally placed to take advantage of its position as an "Asian" sport / lifestyle, and that sponsorship from US companies of Asian badminton tournaments would be likely. Instead it seems more likely that the Asian companies will import the US sports such as baseball , basketball, and the IBF wrongly assumes that it must compete with these US sports by becoming more similar to them.
Here are some of my ideas how to increase the possibilities for commercials. Change to 5 x 9 for men, 5 x 7 for women, serving score. 90s breaks between sets, but with 5 min between set 3 to 4, coaching of course allowed. Add fixed timeouts (60s), maybe when anyone has reached 5/4 points (?) in the first two sets, and give the players one timeout (60s) each to use at will during the first three sets. This gives at minimum 4 fixed occasions for commercials and max 6 if the match only lasts for three sets. If the match isn't decided after three sets then have one fixed timeout in the fourth set and allow each of the players one more "free" timeout to use for the rest of the match (4th and 5 th set). So for a 4 set match it would mean minimum 6 breaks, max 8. 5 sets gives minimum 7 breaks and max 9. The reason I don't want to have any fixed timeout in neither the 3rd nor 5th set is beacuse I want to really make the "free" timeouts to be of tactical importance. This also means the *player* has to show more of personal mental and tactical skill. Add that to ask for a timeout you have to be in possesion of serve, which means that you can't disturb your opponents "point scoring flow" by asking for a timeout. The fixed timeouts might of course constitute such disturbance.... I think this gives plenty of time for commercials and coaching, but still not interupting the play too much. / mats
Ok here is another model I've been thinking out how to include commercial breaks and coaching timeouts. Once again I base it around a 5 x 9 resp 5 x 7 serving score system, but it could be modified to work with the present scoring system. However what I suggest is that two shorter (30s) fixed breaks in all sets are introduced, maybe at 4 & 7 resp. 3 & 5 points. The players will be able to get coaching in the *first* break in each set. Then they will have one timeout (30s or 60s) at their disposition for the first three sets, and one more for eventual 4th and 5th sets. So this will mean minimum 8 breaks (3 sets) and maximum 18 (5 sets), coaching allowed at least 7 times (3 sets) resp. 14 (5 sets) if all timeouts are used. / mats
okay - i might be rubbish at stats, but i can code almost completed a very basic way of simulating lots of games in order to get a feel for the figures. basically the sim plays A vs B in a similar fashion to how seven's maths works. using a random number to determine the winner of a rally and weightings for players A and B. i have A play B 1000 times. the sim collates all the data from the 1000 games and returns the win ratio for player A, and the average number of rally's per game. I'm working on recording things like comebacks, scoring streaks, and tight games. when i have it all together i'll let you all take a look o did i mention it doesn't just do it for one set of weightings - it runs right thru from 1-100 for A, with B having 100-A weighting. hoping to get some interesting results.. neil
Yes, this should be interesting. And it is easier to implement than pure theoretical maths! Keep us updated when you get some results!
sheesh, that blew some cobwebs away, i've been coding in PHP and ASP for so long that my C is very rusty - got there in the end - take a look at the attached txt file for a very basic set of results. Some obvious conclusions - the model is very basic, mathmatically a 1vs99 match is always going to result in the 99 winning 1000/1000 games since the chance of the 1% player winning to rallys in succession is 1/1000. i may run this again for bigger numbers of games but i don't know if it really proves anything.. anyway tell me what you think. cheers,
a new set of results guys, i've added in whitewashes and close games. the rules i'm using for whitewashes is that a player wins 15-0, and the rule for close games is that neither player gets a run of four points in a row. i think this signify's that neither player holds the serve for a long time or that either player gets a big lead throughout the match. just working on comebacks now. - hehe added this in now comebacks are games won after being more than 8 points behind. but i still need to work in setting... :S and then build in rally scoring - altho that shouldn't be difficult i don't think... ps the file is actually a csv, so open it in excel to see the figure. watch this space for more analysis Neil
well guys, i spent quite a while working on this today - and much fun it has been now i have a fairly big simulation, covering both rally and serve scoring. With setting built in for serve scoring, and a tie break rule (must win by 3 clear points) built in for rally scoring. the files are attached for each. any questions just ask. oh - the rally scoring play only to 21 - but i can tweak pretty much all the settings if necesary. hope you guys enjoy the figures.. it's certainly been interesting plugging away at it. hehe - can't quite imagine that as many badminton games have been played as i have simulated today - must be in the million games region anyway - enjoy - and give me a shout if you want to see any other figures. ta Neil
Something seems funny about the figures. My nose suspects either a bug or a lack of randomness in your random number generator (if you are using one). Player A seems to regularly do better than player B given the same %chance e.g. from rally scoring A% 43 wins=0.2 i.e. B=57 wins 0.8 A% 57 wins=0.87 In serve scoring I might have put it down to A always serving first and having a little advantage (unless you randomised who served first), but in rally scoring it shouldn't matter.
i'm going to make a wild guess here- i think it might be to do with rounding some numbers a certain way. trying to iron it out at the moment.
hmm, well i changed a few things that should have made a difference, but i can't really tell that well - it seems to be a bit more balanced... i think..
I think we should get rid off Punch Gunalan from IBF. Fact is that Volleyball still has not increase its TV coverage with new scoring system. Badminton is the only sport need to kill animals for ..? come on 'Punch' ! You think that the number of geese killed will be reduced with shuttlecocks made from nylon ? ask this question yourself, why is the price of dead goose is more expensive than a dozens of shuttlecocks ? which one is the by product ?. We can just clip the feathers that we need from the goose wing to make shuttlecock, not the entire feathers of each goose will be use to make shuttlecock. I can accept other arguments to use nylon or artificial feathers but stop using that argument that we need to kill to play. Allowing to challenge linejudge decisions, why not all the way allowing to spit at them too. I try to make my point here, are we trying to attract people to watch the game of Badminton or 'John McIntyre' theatrical act ?
Changes are needed After watching the Sudirman Cup series, I feel badminton pouplarity is in the downslide as only few "mice and cats" can be seen on the early stage of the event, even the Final was not sold out. Few things I think should be done to improve the situation -Change the current 15 point system and allow either side to score regardless who hold the service, this will shorten the games and encourage players to be more aggressive hence makes the game more exciting to watch. Volleyball has made such changes long time ago and it's working. -Limit time out to 2 on each game. The current system is very inconsistent as when the players are allow to towel down, really depends on who's the umpire. I think make it an official that each side has 2 time out(30 seconds) per game so players need to use it wisely. -Time allow between point is also too long, I think set it to 10 seconds from the moment the point is won to the begining of next serve. If floor is wet then mob it within 10 seconds. Intentional delay should be fine with 1 point deduction after 1 warning(similar to NBA). -Service fault call is too subjective but not sure what can be done on that department. It's like a baseball strike zone, the umpire/service judge paint the box and players try to adapt to it. -Encourage players to have multiple logos(size limit) on shirt(instead of just Yonex) else badmnton will always be just the Yonex/Carlton sports, not good enough to make this sport survive. -IBF ... not sure what to do with it More idea???? -
On ther other hand, tennis matches are long, with long breaks, and people still watch those... and the time between points in tennis is easily as long as the time between badminton points. likely longer. The issue of global popularity I think is due to a number of things. Badminton has a lot of support certainly in asia and in parts of europe because it's been nurtured there for a long time. Martin Dew-Hattins wrote an excellent article about the club system in Denmark, and when I look at the way the club system is there, it makes me think WOW, that really is how it should be. The general public has an understanding of the game, and it's easier to market to a public that knows what the game is about. If we're going to be serious about making the game more popular, we need to start following the examples of the countries where it's most popular. Badminton certainly needs better marketing in North America. As has been pointed out, the average american thinks of a racket in one hand and a beer in the other when the subject of badminton comes up. (or they say, 'oh yeah, we used to have a badminton table in the garage'... wait no, that's table tennis...) To better market the sport where it's less popular, the more exposure, the better. More sponsors, more demonstrations. Article by Martin Dew-Hattins Danish Club Badminton
And don't forget golf. Can any other widely televised sport claim to be more tranquil and takes longer? And yet, look at golf's popularity to the extent of having its own golf channel on TV! While IBF has fingered the length of badminton matches as the main contributing factor for the lack of badminton popularity and TV broadcasts, I don't know whether that should be the main focus. IMHO, if a spectator doesn't appreciate or respect the skills and physical demands of a sport, he/she won't embrace it. I used to think watching golf is the biggest time-waster ... until I became a golfer myself and started to appreciate what it takes to play the level of golf seen on TV, and the strategic thinking that goes on behind a player's course management skills. I agree with you that "nuturing" the sport is a key to increasing badminton's popularity. Unfortunately, nuturing takes time, effort, money, commitment, organization, passion, and last but not least, vision. Most people look at badminton as a backyard sport. Something to kill time waiting for the BBQ to be ready ("and gosh, I hope there is some wind so that the game can be more fun!"). For people to start taking badminton more seriously, I think the schools have a large role to play. Get the football, soccer, hockey, basketball, and baseball players of your school team to play badminton so that they appreciate the physical power, agility, coordination, reflex, and stamina required to play a good game of badminton (by now you probably catch on that I am from Canada). Until then, we don't have a start. And that will be too bad because for too many of us, badminton is certainly one of the best kept secrets in sports!
I think one of the problems is people who know nothing about badminton generally think that it is a very slow game. Most don't get to see how the game is played at a proper level. To increase popularity you need to organise things like charity benefit matches between top players in places like shopping centres where passers by can stop and watch for a while. Some of the main halls near me are used for nothing but badminton, so the only people who go into them are those who already play. Hence it doesn't really do anything for getting new recruits. Also badminton doesn't get much tv exposure here, which doesn't help.
Big Slick: very good points. Same here in the U.S. most people think of Badminton as a "backyard" game. Very few know it's the fastest racket sport. In America, we're all about speed, power, endurance, we love extreme stuff. If the All England Open or similar was shown during prime time in the U.S., and the speed of the shuttle clocked like they do in baseball, I think a lot of people would take notice.
