Skip to main content

Chong Wei hopes BWF will make world meet a biennial event

Lee Chong Wei returns a shot to Germany’s Dieter Domke during the second round of the World Championships in Copenhagen on Wednesday. — Bernama
Lee Chong Wei returns a shot to Germany’s Dieter Domke during the second round of the World Championships in Copenhagen on Wednesday. — Bernama

COPENHAGEN: It is no secret that world No. 1 Lee Chong Wei wants to win his first world title.

He has another wish too – for the World Championships to be held once every two years instead of yearly now.

On Wednesday, top seed Chong Wei took another step closer to achieving his childhood dream when he crushed towering German Dieter Domke 21-12, 21-9 in the second round of the World Championships at the Ballerup Super Arena.

Chong Wei should get past his next opponent Scott Evans of Ireland for a place in the quarter-finals.
“I’m here to win the world title but, for now, I’d rather take it one match a day. I don’t want to get all muddled up by thinking about the final. I shouldn’t be over-confident – I know that the matches will only get tougher from here,” said Chong Wei.

Chong Wei, who is competing in his eighth world meet, hopes that the Badminton World Federation (BWF) will make the championships a biennial event – a plea he has been repeatedly making for the last few years.

Chong Wei has been playing in every World Championships since BWF made it an annual affair, starting with the 2005 edition in Anaheim. The world meet is not held in the Olympic Games year.

“Two years once will be much better. It will be more prestigious and players will really look forward to it,” said Chong Wei.

“Maybe, the BWF can reduce the number of players too. Instead of having to go through three rounds, we can cut down one round. The quality will be better.

“Right now, there are so many Superseries tournaments and the schedule is rather crowded. To have a world meet once in two years will be ideal and give us some breathing space.”

On the ongoing 21st edition of the world meet, Chong Wei has only one grouse: “The stadium is great and the players’ hotel is comfortable. However, I wish that the transportation for players will be better. In tennis, players are given cars to move around.”

While Chong Wei is the only one left to shoulder the Malaysian challenge in the men’s singles, Denmark – with a population of only five million people – have three players in the third round. They are Jan O Jorgensen, Hans-Kristian Vittinghus and Viktor Axelsen.

China suffered a minor setback when 2009 world junior champion and 11th seed Tian Houwei lost 15-21, 16-21 to veteran Eric Pang of Holland and failed to join second seed Chen Long and sixth seed Wang Zhengming in the last 16.


by Rajes Paul - The Star

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ex-coach's jail sentence cut to a year

PUTRAJAYA: The Court of Appeal yesterday sentenced former athletics coach C. Ramanathan to 12 months' jail for molesting two junior athletes 19 years ago. A three-man bench led by Datuk Mohd Hishamudin Mohd Yunus unanimously dismissed Ramanathan's appeal against conviction, but varied the jail sentence of four years to a year, which was to run concurrently. Following yesterday's ruling, Ramanathan, 75, a former teacher, walked out a free man as he had served 10 months in Kajang Prison. Convicts get one-third remission for good behaviour while in prison. However, he will lose his pension. Hishamudin, who sat with Datuk Abdul Wahab Patail and Datuk Linton Albert, said the court found no merit to overturn the conviction. "However, in reducing the sentence, we considered Ramanathan's age and the long years the appeal has taken." Deputy public prosecutor Awang Armadajaya Awang Mahmud submitted that then High Court judge Tan Sri Abdull Hamid E...
2 comments
Read more

Badminton: Fans rooting for all-Malaysian semis

Reports: RAJES PAUL KUALA LUMPUR: The home fans will be rooting for an all-Malaysian men’s singles semi-final between Lee Chong Wei and Liew Daren. But Chong Wei is more fancied to advance than Daren in quarter-final matches against Indonesian Simon Santoso and Dane Peter Gade-Christensen respectively at the Putra Stadium in Bukit Jalil today. Yesterday, Chong Wei defeated Vietnamese Nguyen Tien Minh 21-9, 18-21, 21-7 in a second-round match that saw the world number one struggling to adapt to the draught in the stadium in the second game. And Daren continued a fairy tale run in his home Open, blowing away a toothless Hsueh Hsuan-yi of Taiwan 21-14, 21-12. Although Choong Wei had to slog for the win over Tien Minh, the top seed and defending champion felt that he was playing better by the day. “I got off to a good start but found it hard to cope with the draught. I tried to catch up after losing my momentum but that did not happen and I decided to conserve energy for ...
11 comments
Read more

Rajagobal Let Off The Hook

PETALING JAYA, April 24 (Bernama) -- National head coach Datuk K. Rajagobal was let off the hook by the Football Association of Malaysia's (FAM) Disciplinary Committee after finding no evidence that he had violated FAM's Article 88, as claimed. FAM Disciplinary Committee chairman Datuk Taufik Abdul Razak said the committee had decided not to charge Rajagobal after carefully analysing the video of the post-match press conference by the 56-year-old coach. "After listening to the recording of the post-match press conference, we decided to drop the charge against Rajagopal as he did not make such a statement. "Maybe his (Rajagobal) assessment and comments of the match was misconstrued by the media. There was no mention of the FAM policy throughout his comments," said Taufik after emerging from a three-hour Disciplinary Committee meeting at Wisma FAM in Kelana Jaya, here, Wednesday. Rajagobal who does not mince his words when asked to com...
4 comments
Read more