St. Jakobshalle, Basel txt: Dille Andersen, WBSO,Int.Press photo: topbadminton.com The final in the Women's Doubles had Korea, represented by Lee Hyo Jubg/Lee Won Kyung on one side, and China, represented by Zhao Tingting/Wei Yang on the other. Both were 5/8 seeded at this event. China came out on top from the very beginning although Lee/Lee didn't make it at all easy for them! Occassionally the play was speeded up with some smashes but mostly the rallies were incredibly long! Whether this was due to slow shuttles or simply that none of the parties had any desire to make mistakes is unknown. In the second game there was no doubt of the outcome! Zhao Tingting, CHN, was by far the best player in this encounter. It was she who dominated by the net, and also made the most decisive points! Lee Hyo Jung, KOR, who earlier won the Mixed Doubles event with partner Lee Dae Won, was now runner-up. China Win's this Women's Doubles 21-15, 21-10.
China only sent one pair this time. I suspect that they did this on purpose to let Zhao Tingting/Yang Wei win the title without strong competitions from other Chinese pairs. LYB did this for the ultimate purpose to split Yang/Zhang JW. Now since Zhao/Yang won, and Yang/Zhang failed at AE, is this enough to retire Zhang Jiewen?
I'm so happy that Zhao Ting2 could win this title.It proves that she's still the best.I like her very much
1 failure does not erase Zhang/Yang's success over the years. Plus, Zhang JW is no where "too old", consider how lack of competition outside CHN team is. I think mostly Zhang JW will be asked to paired up with a younger player, to be the leader of a new pair, unless she chooses to end her competitive career right here.
Zhao Tingting was pretty impressive, attacking the net. Strong smash too, I wonder why she was not given much of a chance after Wei Yili returned to her original World Junior Champion partner. Zhang Jiewen is not too old, only 1 year older than Tingting and Yili. I would expect her to pair with newer player, and provide continuity to the CHN dominance. If she retires right now, it would be a waste of her experience (though CTF might be happy, can spend more time with her).
I think there are some politics involved. Zhao TIngting never win anything big, even never win anything. But stay in the national team for quite long time, has tried to pair with all kinds of people, in both women's doubles and mixed doubles. Many partner were gone, but she still stay. So one theory is that coaches (other coaches instead of LYB) try hard to let Zhao Tingting win something. Some people pointed out that LYB split Yang/Zhang even not for Zhao Tingting, but for Du/Yu. Since Du/Yu are far behind in the ranking, so LYB wanted to split Yang/Zhang so that Du/Yu can ranked within top 3 for WC and OG. LYB thought women's double like a gift, he can give to whoever he likes because all other countries are too weak. All those are theories, difficult to verify.
That is true. It doesn't matter who plays with who in CHN WD team. they will beat any other pair. Even Du/Yu (4th CHN pair) can beat the best of the rest (LKW/LHJ)
Definitely agree you guys' analytical thoughts=): Only thing seems to be unfair for YangWei/Zhang Jiewen is that they can't be the WD champion for Olympics2008 TOGETHER. In other words, would be quite 'brutal' for them fight against each other, which fans of the two wouldn't wanna see....:crying: Wondering who Zhang Jiewen will partner with.?? Why not seperate Gao Ling/Huang X?
Zhao Tingting finally wins a WD title after how many years? I felt bad for her because every tournament I saw that she partnered with so many different partners in WD and XD. In mixed she played with Zheng Bo, Chen Xu, Zhang Jun, and even XXZ (even though it was an exhibition). In WD she partnered with Zhang Dan, one of Du/Yang, and finally Yang Wei. Maybe Yang Wei is the right partner for her in WD. I think for XD her best partner was XXZ and Chen Xu, but XXZ is now retired so she should play with Chen Xu instead of Zhang Jun.
I think (and Ranking and results wise) her best Partner in XD was Chen Qiqiu. In WD maybe not read too much into this win until later tournaments when other CHN pairs are present.
She also played XD with Chen Qiqiu, and I quite liked that pairing, but it was, of course, overshadowed by Gao Ling/Zhang Jun. edit: you beat me to it JD
I agree, but he's retired as well. I was talking about the many different partners ZTT has had in XD and WD after being split apart from Chen Qiqui and Wei Yili. Out of that group, it seems Chen Xu/ZTT is the best pairing. They even reached the final of the China Open. After changing from her regular partners Chen Qiqui and Wei Yili, it was all downhill for ZTT. Hopefully this means a new start for her!
Right!! Don't they wanna 'defend' the title together? Winning together means they two really on the top, one win & the other lose perhaps would be 'unfair' for either one of them . Although i personally like ZJiewen a bit more =): Ya, ChenQQ/ZhaoTT has always been one of the best XD pairs! QQ/TT's playing actually wasn't bad at all, just like mentioned just not that oversharp compared to GL/ZJ..... Does ZTT tend to be a bit too emotional in games s.t.?
It's nothing but all politics. As the national team coach, LYB wants to see the least is original pair from province. Yang wei and Zhang JW came from the same local team, while Gao lin and Huang Sui were from different provinces. LYB wants to mix the pair from different provinces, so that: 1st, to show his role to make a better pair than the local team, 2nd, to manage them easily, 3rd, to balance the interest of different provinces. Since there are also competitions between different provinces, so using Zhao TT will make him also fair to the local teams if the local pair can dominant, where is his leadership as a national team manager?
.... Baseline sounds a great point.... if i didn't remember wrong that YaWei/ZhangJieWen were all from Canton Team but didn't really get many chances to PRACTICE together as they were supposed to be before they wore the crown of Olympics 2004. ZJW always got sick or some accidents, & they had to practice seperately b4 meeting up for games. (And they 2 are from different baddy club in Canton Team =): Truth is once they partner, they seem to be unbeatable till recent year.... Seemed that originally LYB partnered them up was to purposely against the Korean WD pairs according their strengths / playing styles. Turned out that they 2 beat not only strong Korean WD, but also any WD in the world including GL/Huang S.
Yeah, ZJW does seem to get injured a lot, remembered her with all the bracings and support during Thomas/Uber Cup 2004. She did recover well enough to win Olympic Title with YW.
I think LYB should make an experiment to put Zhao TT and Zhang Wei to play together in XD just like Lee hyo jung and Lee young dae.Zhao TT is senior while Zhang Wei is junior.
