After watching a China versus South Korea Match on TV I was appalled at the blatant cheating of the players to lose their match in order to ensure an easier route into the latter stages of the tournament.
There has been another incident reported too involving Indonesia and South Korea again.
Having read the reports earlier today and watched some of the match yesterday, I am astounded that BWF has not taken swift and serious action. I understand there are huge political issues in the background here, that we know little about. However, it is clear that match “fixing” has been taking place for some time, especially in the lead up to Olympic qualification and this needs to be stamped out. Sadly, BWF appears to turn a blind eye to it.
In my opinion, some of these players, or should we say the coaches/decision-makers have long since forgotten what particiapting in the Olympics or any sport at professional level should be about. What we as spectators wish to see are players wearing a gold medal to honour the fact they have strived, sacrificed and above all, beaten rivals fairly on their way to winning the coveted gold medal. This is what every tournament is about, or should be about and the Olympic spirit should be present in every match of every event.
Sadly, this blatant cheating, supposed a copycat response from South Korean players to the Chinese players, resulted in the crowd booing the players and the referee showing the players a black card but NOT following through and properly issuing it. Shame, because this would have sent ripples through the badminton tournament world that this behaviour is totally unacceptable.
From what I can gather, the Chinese No1 seeded players were deliberately trying to lose to avoid playing the No2 seeded Chinese pair at the latter stages of the tournament. This, in my opinion is blatant cheating by the organisors of the team, although not unusual.
I believe the players should have been immediately disqualified, therefore ensuring they had no say in the outcome of the tournament and their place should have been taken by those who were knocked out by them.
Thankfully the BWF in a meeting later in the day, disqualified the players and gave their places to pairs who had previously been knocked out of the competition in the group stages.
On the one hand this is definitely the right thing to do – make an example of the pairs. However, there are many sides to this decision. Firstly, this sends a message to the badminton world that this behaviour will not be tolerated. Question is, is the disqualification a big enough punishment and is it the players who should be disqualified?
Second, this means there is potential that we as an audience are deprived of watching some of the best pairs compete in the latter stages of the competition. Why on earth should the world’s number 1 ranked pair, and winners of numerous tournaments need to perform like this? The answer is that they were told to do so. And that is where we have a problem. Yes, they may wish to save themselves having already qualified, but really, is there any need to not try? Why not do the opposite and go full out, win in two games and get off court knowing you’ve had more court time, getting used to the conditions, which is far better preparation for the next stage in the competition.
The biggest issue here is that the players were told to throw the games. The South Korean coaches admitted copying China. That was a bad judgement. However, the Chinese have been allowed to “fix” matches in order for players to qualify. Nobody can forget Lin Dan losing in 2008 All England final to Chen Jin which gave the latter sufficient points to qualify for the Olympic games in Beijing. And, history was repeated this year when Chen Jin won virtually the last qualifying event of the year, beating Lin Dan, which gave him sufficient points to overtake Peter Gade’s 4th place ranking which gained him qualification to London.
So, this kind of match fixing has been happpening for years and BWF has consistently turned a blind eye to it. Chen Jin is a brilliant player. But, if it wasn’t for his win, he would not have qualified. Personally, I believe BWF has a very difficult decision to make. Thankfully they made the right decision in disqualifying the players concerned in the matches. However, steps should be taken to address the greater concern that match fixing of sorts exists in our fantastic sport at the highest level and BWF doesn’t do a thing about it.
At the end of the day, China is a superb badminton and sporting nation. However, if they have to resort to cheating to win more tournaments, then something needs to be done. The problem is, I’m not sure BWF has the bottle do it.
It is a disgrace by throwing the match away without any sort of effort. But cheating and play acting happens in many other sports. If you know by finishing the final round of a football match in a draw will avoid playing Spain or Brazil in the knockout stage, would you play for the win? Of course not. That’s the way it is.
Regarding points for Chen Jin, it’s like F1 Racing, you let the main driver win. Ok they have new rules regarding this but priority still exists. Olympics is a team competition so the team takes priority. Lin Dan has won so many and he will not be there for long, he should be looking at coaching and training fresh blood like Chen Long, like most of us, passing on the knowledge and experience to the younger players, the future of the club and country.
The group stage is wrong anyway, should have played knockout from the beginning with qualifying rounds like the normal championships.
HF07
HF07
I agree they should have played knock out format and not group.
Whilst i accept in F1 you let the main driver win, you still can’t compare because you are still racing against every other racing driver on the track. In a badminton match, there is just the opponent. And when they are from another country, to try and throw a match is rediculous.
Paul
I find it bizzare that badminton be treated as a “squad” game rather than as individual or doubles..
Your squad players cannot help you (other than by throwing games :–) ) like they can on a football pitch for example.
Tennis agreed is primarily singles, but I would argue that badminton singles is easily as relevent as badminton doubles. The players in badminton that have received the most fame/recongition have to be singles player “Lin Dan”, “Lee Chong Wei”, maybe “Peter Gade” as well….
Do players like LCW not get funding from Yonex etc then ?
Yes, players like LCW will get funding and most of these players will play to win at all times.
But there are occasions, when Olympic qualification matters that a higher voice may decide on the outcome of a match, if it means a compatriot qualifying for such a big event. This is when the needs of “the country” outweigh the needs of an individual – to give the country a greater chance of winning more medals.
This is certainly the case with Lin Dan and Chen Jin matches both at All England final in 2008 and earlier this year which miraculously gave Chen Jin sufficient points to qualify for London.
It would seem that the greater good of the country/team can be given priority over an individual player or pair.
Paul
No matter what rules and regulations are enforced into badminton, you would never be able to be 100% certain that both players on court are playing to the best of their abilities at all times. For me, this is a problem as there will always be doubt in the minds of those watching at wether they are watching a fantastic spectacle or a pre-arranged game where the players are “acting” for the result required.
With the current format of badminton, China will continue to reign supreme as they will always have control of the top ranked players as they can easily manipulate the results to ensure this happens.
The ONLY way to stop this is to change the format of badminton right from its roots upwards…
For this, I can only ask some simple questions.. WHY does badminton not work to the same world rankings format as that of tennis ? Why do the games not be played the same format as tennis ? Why have a group section in the olympics when the format olympics tennis used would have been just as easy to use and would have guaranteed no cheating by countries trying to get all their teams into the final places.
Tennis works.. there is never talk of throwing games for compatriates… and it is much more popular than badminton… (not as good a game though 🙂 ) …I do not think that women wearing skirts can be the only reason tennis is more popular..
Interesting that you use tennis as a comparison.
The focus in tennis is singles and therefore this breeds a different kind if mentality to the game. Badminton has a greater emphasis on doubles and the squad as a whole compared to tennis, and maybe that’s why there can be these fixed games. Purely because the focus can be on the easiest route through the tournament. There also seems to be a closer link to the national squad rather than the go-it-alone star that is more prevalent in tennis.
I also wonder whether badminton would follow tennis if more money was available in the game. Badminton does not get the TV coverage that tennis gets, and as yet fallen short in terms of viewers both for international events and on TV. This means sponsorship of our sport is significantly below that in tennis.
In badminton, all funding is controlled by the Badminton Association. Therefore players cannot afford to go-it-alone as they do in tennis. This ensures the powers at be have the ultimate say over a player and that cannot always be a good thing.
Paul
Yep, she quits. What else could she do ? Face it: they play that match, get off court, face their coach/trainer (who’s involved or not), end of match and then the fun starts: in the Olympic village you meet your country team members, other sport people, journalists, officials, family, friends, sponsor representatives, and-so-on… In this youtube-era, these matches will be visable for years to come, what will youth players think of this ? What if you were the sponsor responsable for Li-Ning/Viktor/Yonex, would you want to sponsor one of those 8 ? Read what Lin Dan has to say about the international glance of the sport on the BWF facebookpage, why he went to the Laureus Awards ceremony, …. Those 8 people (or more) smashed this to smithereens (literal). Paul is right, I hope we can see badminton on the Olympics to come. A really sad moment for the sport.
Cheers, ED
Paul,
Just as an aside to the many valid points you raise in this article; I have been told that as a result of being made a scapegoat of this situation (and having to issue a public apology for her actions) Yu Yang intends to quit badminton with immediate effect.
Of course, this could be a “heat of the moment” reaction but if it’s true then it adds a further sour note to this disreputable chain of events: the worlds best WD player for at least the last 4yrs has chosen to leave the sport. This emphasises how match-fixing / cheating not only damages the sports’ image with the watching and playing public but it also as a detrimental effect on the players as well.
It was also quite revealing that the one nation (of the three involved in this sorry saga) that did not choose to appeal the BWFs decision was China. Perhaps this time even Li Yong Bo realised that the manner of the match-fixing was too blatant to defend. (The Chen Jin vs Lin Dan matches you refer to, as well as the Zhou Mi vs Zhang Ning SF from the Athens Olympics, at least contained a few plausible rallies even if the results were never in doubt but the WD scenes of 31st Jul were wholly pathetic).
On the positive side of things, we’re only a couple of games away from a potential MD final of FHF/CY vs LYD/JJS and I’m sure I’m not alone in hoping that it pans out like that – their World Championship Final match in 2009 in Pakistan was one of the greatest matches in the sports’ history – any chance of a repeat boys?!
Ali
Yes it would be great to have a FHF/CY vs LYD/JJS final, and let’s hope it’s as good as 2009 World Championship Final.
If Yu Yang has quit the game, then I am sorry as she has been the outstanding ladies doubles player for the last 4 years, as you say, winning everything in the game and with different partners.
There’s no doubt the power of Li Yongbo, head coach for Chinese National Team, has and whether he was responsible for this farce is still unclear. I admired him as a player and now as a coach, but he has previously admitted to rigging matches. Therefore I wouldn’t be surprised if it was his decision to throw this match to set up a China vs China final.
At the end of the day, badminton loses and the consequences could be far reaching than the current decision. The powers at be in the Olympic Committee could decide to withdraw badminton from 2020 Olympics.
Paul
1 People paid for these tickets, to watch Olympic level badminton (not recreational)
2 Blaming the system is cheap, even if it is not perfect
3 China did this so many times, finally somebody had the nerves to take action (though I think the audience is to be thanked, they were the spark)
4 Korea surprised me, but most of all Indonesia
5 As a world player/trainer/coach, how on earth can you do this in a full stadium, half the world watching you ?
I can go on and on here, for any sport, not just badminton. I slightly agree maybe a few years ban from international level would be at its place. All my respect goes to the people who took the decision, and the players/coaches/trainers who honour their sport and the Olympic spirit.
All the best, ED