Denmark enters Thomas Cup in full team 'to fight' Indonesia

Denmark enters Thomas Cup in full team 'to fight' Indonesia

JAKARTA (JP): Denmark, Europe's strongest badminton country,
arrived here yesterday with promises of a daunting challenge for
the hosts in the race for Thomas Cup.

With doubles specialist Thomas Lund managing to recover from
his knee injury, Denmark looks confident to steal the limelight
in the May 10-21 finals. The Thomas Cup second seed's hopes in
the singles will rest on world number four singles Poul-Erik
Hoyer-Larsen and his seventh ranked teammate Thomas Stuer
Lauridsen.

Coach Morten Frost Hansen told waiting reporters shortly after
landing at Soekarno-Hatta Iternational Arport yesterday that
Denmark's minimal is advance to the semifinals.

"We will beat South Korea en route to clinching the semifinal
slot," Frost, three-time All England winner and formerly a Thomas
Cup competitor, said.

"We also take the advantage of getting used to the climate
here earlier," said Frost, adding that his players will not be
troubled with Jakarta's tropical climate since they have played
here many times.

Denmark is grouped with defending champion Malaysia, dark-
horse South Korea and Thailand. The Danes are pitted against
Thailand in their opening matches on May 11.

Denmark will likely stick to Stuer-Lauridsen at first singles,
despite the latest rankings issued by the International Badminton
Federation (IBF) which placed him behind Hoyer-Larsen.

"The rankings figure on the players' performances 18 months
ago," said Frost who believes Stuer-Lauridsen is still Denmark's
number one. He admitted, however, both players are very close in
quality.

Lund, who topped the 1993 world badminton grand prix rankings
with Jon Holst-Christiansen, will make his first appearance after
a three-month layoff. "I'm improving now, even though I won't be
a hundred percent fit for next week's finals," Lund, who had only
three-week's preparation for the biennial event, said.

The Danish contingent also included Denmark's Uber Cup team,
who also possess world beating shuttlers. The Chinese and
Japanese squads arrived an hour later. The organizers have
billeted all the participants and officials at the Jakarta Hilton
International hotel.

Changing schedule

The organizing committee have announced that the daily program
will start an hour earlier than the previous schedule to help
journalists. The organizers, however, will let matches involving
the host's teams begin at 7.30 p.m. as scheduled.

"Both IBF and honorary referees have approved of the changes,"
chairman of the committee Titus Kurniadi said. He also indicated
that Indonesian teams might reschedule their matches if
neccesary. "We are thinking about this," he said.

Many local and foreign journalists had earlier complained that
the late evening games would hamper them from making their
deadlines.

All the visiting teams will start their training sessions here
at Senayan badminton hall at Jl. Asia Afrika today. The
Indonesian teams receive the privilege to use the Senayan indoor
stadium, the venue for the finals. (amd)