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Gold medalist shuttler rues London jinx
Susi Susanti: (JP)Susi Susanti, who won a gold medal for women’s singles badminton at the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games, says she regrets the antics that cost eight women shuttlers — including an Indonesian pair — their shot at the badminton gold in London this week
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Susi Susanti: (JP)
Susi Susanti, who won a gold medal for women’s singles badminton at the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games, says she regrets the antics that cost eight women shuttlers — including an Indonesian pair — their shot at the badminton gold in London this week.
“As former athlete, I think it’s not good that the players were attempting to deliberately default their games in order to avoid opponents. That hurts the spirit of sportsmanship,” Susi said.
Susi, who also won a bronze medal at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, blamed the incident on the current round-robin stage system that makes it possible for athletes from the same country to clash in the knock-out stage.
She said that the Badminton World Federation (BWF) and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) needed to evaluate the system.
“This is an Olympic game, the highest event in world sports competition, and is no place for fooling around,” she told The Jakarta Post in Jakarta on Wednesday.
In other matches, world No. 12 Indonesian shuttler Taufik Hidayat had to abandon his dreams for a repeat of his glory in 2004 after he was defeated 9-21, 12-21 by world leading player Lin Dan of China in the knock-out stage. The match between world No. 6 Simon Santoso and Malaysian world No. 2 Lee Chong Wei was still underway at press time.
Adrianti Firdasari, was no match for China’s Wang Xin – going down 15-21, 8-21.
Indonesia still has hope in the mixed doubles, as Tontowi Ahmad and Liliyana Natsir advanced to the semifinals after beating Birgit Michels and Michael Fuchs of Germany 21-15, 21-9.
