Indonesian juniors reach quarters of badminton World C'ships
Indonesian juniors reach quarters of badminton World C'ships
JAKARTA (JP): Indonesia ensured its place in the final stage
of the team event at the World Junior Badminton Championships on
Friday, and will meet Japan on Sunday.
In the morning session, second-seed Indonesia defeated the
Netherlands 5-0. The country's youngsters also defeated New
Zealand 5-0.
Team manager Yacob Rusdianto said in a telephone interview
from Guangzhou, China, that he hoped his players could perform
well enough to beat Japan.
"On paper, we should win against Japan. If we lose, we won't
be able to fulfill our ambition of reaching the semifinals," he
said.
Indonesian boys singles shuttler Sony Dwi Kuncoro had to work
hard to overcome Eric Pang of the Netherlands 7-1, 4-7, 7-3, 7-0.
Mona Santoso lost the first game of her match 5-7 before
fighting back to post a 5-7, 7-2, 8-6, 7-5 victory in the girls
singles.
The boys doubles team of Hendra AG and Markis Kido had a
comfortable 7-2, 7-3, 7-3 win over Gijs van Heijster and Youri
Lapre. In the girls doubles, Lita Nurlita and Endang also easily
won, defeating Maartje Verheul and Michelle Prins 7-2, 7-1, 7-4.
The mixed doubles team of Hendra AG and Lita crushed Lapre and
Prins 7-0, 7-2, 7-3.
Later in the afternoon, the Indonesian team replaced boys
singles Sony with Ardiansyah and girls singles Mona with Dewi
Tira.
However, the official results of the event were not available
as of press time.
Yacob named Germany, the fourth seed here, as the dark horse
at the championships, with host and top seed China also posing a
threat.
"Germany will face Chinese Taipei on Sunday and I think it
will be a great match. Germany's juniors are the best among the
European countries."
The International Badminton Federation (IBF) is using the
tournament as the first official experiment with a new scoring
system.
Under the new system there are only seven points in a game,
with a best-of-five-game system for matches.
IBF director of events Vanessa Freeman said in a press
release: "We are looking at several ways of improving the
presentation of badminton to make it more exciting for both
spectators and television audiences. The key objectives of using
this scoring system are to create more 'crucial' points and to
reduce the length of a match."
The first World Junior Championships were held in Jakarta in
1992. At this year's installment of the event in Guangzhou, 287
competitors from 34 countries will compete over 10 days in team
and individual competitions. China has the biggest contingent
with 42 shuttlers, followed by Indonesia with 22.
Previous World Junior Champions include China's Sun Jun, the
current world champion, 2000 Olympians Gu Jun and Gao Ling of
China and Denmark's Peter Gade Christensen.