I think in 2007 it was the golden age of Polish team. Wacha was playing in singles his best. Also the XD Mateusiak & Zieba was ready to win vs top world pairs. And there were still two very good doubles: Logosz & Mateusiak and Augustyn & Kostiuczyk (Zieba). This WD won the Denmark Open 2006 and MD 4 times was in SF of European Championships and one time in QF of OG (Beijing 2008). The only relative weakness was WS. So in 2007 it was a peak when all these five players played at the top level. In 2009 the squad was not so strong (finished 15th) and in 2011 worse (finished 19.). Later Poland did not participated and was not in a position to prepare a good team. In 2010 the men's team was enough strong to win the silver medal during European Team Championships but the women's team was already poor. It was the XD Mateusiak/Zieba as you know who got the best results in the period 2008-2016 .
Pictures from SF of the tournament: https://www.facebook.com/pg/badzinepl/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1803914192970893
Iskandar lost to Rogalski ? Rogalski is not totally unknown, I've come across his name before, still beating Iskandar,the MAS MS2 , is somettng. Luckily, the MAS boys saved some pride for an all-MAS MS final. Robert and Zieba, the Polish XD pair, I remember them, created a sensation in one of the tournaments (can't recall which one) and , iirc, Robert is almost 40 years old. Przemyslaw Wacha, I remember him too, no shabby MS player at all.
So you have a quite good memory. I can add that XD won two SS, in Indonesia and Hong Kong, was one week #1 in world ranking. And Robert (called in Poland also "Zico") is now 41 old.
Final results MS: LEE Zii Jia (Malaysia) — Joo Ven SOONG (Malaysia) 21-17 21-16 WS: Ayla HUSER (Swiss) — Jordan HART (Wales) 21-19 24-22 MD: Nhat NGUYEN & Paul REYNOLDS (Ireland) — Daniel BENZ & Andreas HEINZ (Germany) 21-19 25-23 WD: Jenny MOORE & Victoria WILLIAMS (England) — MANEESHA K. & Arathi Sara SUNIL (India) 21-19 24-22 XD: Kristoffer KNUDSEN & Isabella NIELSEN (Danmark) — Matthew CLARE & Victoria WILLIAMS (England) 21-13 21-15
... and final matches (pictures): https://www.facebook.com/pg/badzinepl/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1804796746215971
LInk: http://www.tournamentsoftware.com/sport/draw.aspx?id=FAB98C22-8379-457F-A3DB-7CB44C95E909&draw=2
I think it would take a huge amount of time to achieve that, considering his decreasing motivation following recent loses and such. It might not be impossible for him to retire after this, Iskandar once said in local news before.
But the last defeat in Czech Republic was not big. I think it was a good match versus a strong opponent. However I did not watch it.
Strong opponent, but his standard, the MAS standard is high, losing to not-developed country player is already bad enough. Not to mention the failure in Team/Individual events where he failed to live up to expectation.
In the Czech Open he lost to Victor. Of course Victor (Svendsen) does not mean VIKTOR but anyway it was a Danish player. I agree of course that all these results should be not satisfying...
Danish player doesn't mean they are actually very good. Iskandar is way more experienced than him, especially in GPG level. Bad performance from him, just like at Polish.
I wanted to accentuate the positive. But in fact I do not see in TS next tournaments for Iskander. So maybe it is the end.
Perhaps he's retiring around next year, if he decided to. Shame but his performance is in a jumble and muddy water now. Even after SEA Games, he took a lot of time to contemplate his future with coaches.
and that Victor (Swendsen) just lost to our young MAS player Lim Chi Wing, which means Lim Chi Wing is better than Iskandar for now...
Lee Zii Jia luckily gets to escape to the next round in three tight set. I hope he can show some good start in his matches soon.
