Indonesia's Susi Susanti aims for All-England title

Indonesia's Susi Susanti aims for All-England title

BIRMINGHAM, England (AFP): Susi Susanti, the world's most
successful professional badminton player, hopes to win the All-
England trophy to supplement the wedding ring she acquired last
month.

After her long-awaited marriage to fellow Indonesian former
Olympic champion Alan Budikusuma she will be looking to get her
hands on the women's singles trophy once more when the world's
oldest tournament gets underway today.

The All-England, to end on March 15, is likely to be the
penultimate lap in the marathon of Susi's unrivaled decade-long
career, which she may well finish with a flourish by regaining
four of the major titles she has lost.

She has already regained the World Cup and the World Grand
Prix titles in the last three months. If Susi wins back the All-
England as well she may retire after her attempt to regain the
women's singles title at the World Championships in Glasgow in
two months time.

Current form and attitude suggests a triumphant finish may be
imminent, though the great lady remains cagey about whether this
All-England will be her last.

But Susi's assessment after tearfully losing her title at the
Atlanta Olympics was that "I'll play one more year" and nothing
she has said since has indicated otherwise.

The woman who took the gold from her on that occasion, the
South Korean Bang Soo-hyun, has already retired so will not be
defending the All-England title she captured by beating both
Susanti and Ye Zhaoying, the World Champion from China, last
year.

This means that, although Susi has been seeded only fifth, she
must surely be an unofficial favorite to capture her fifth All-
England, and that Ye Zhaoying, seeded three, should be her most
dangerous rival.

Susi is in the same quarter as the new young Chinese star,
Gong Zhichao, who earned the number two seeding after her
achievements in reaching the finals of the Japan Open and the
Korean Open in January.

Ye Zhaoying is in the same half as Mia Audina, the local
teenager who won the Olympic silver medal and who became number
one for the first time after capturing the title in Japan.

Written off

Another famous former titleholder from Indonesia, Heryanto
Arbi, will be fighting for the men's singles title, though he is
not the favorite.

And it will be a crucial All-England for the ninth seed
Heryanto and for the third seeded former world champion Joko
Suprianto, who has been written off more times than any other
leading player but has always answered his detractors.

Both are recovering from injury. Heryanto, who has his world
title to defend in Glasgow in two months, has had his appearances
limited by a calf and back injury.

Joko collapsed during the World Grand Prix finals in Bali in
December and this is his first tournament since recovering from a
torn hamstring.

If he is fit the portents are good. Joko is in the same half
as top-seeded Olympic champion Poul-Erik Hoyer, who has not won
an open tournament in the seven months since his Atlanta triumph.

"That was an occasion of great joy and happiness, but it took
me a long time to get over it," Hoyer admits. "It was time I
should have spent training and practicing, but didn't.

"I'd hoped the Indian Open might have been the tournament in
which I got back my motivation, but it wasn't. But training has
been going well this month and I may be almost 100 percent for
the All-England and will be by the time of the World
Championships."

If he does suddenly regain his form the unpredictably
brilliant Hoyer can challenge seriously for his third successive
All-England title, even though the odds are probably against it.

Other threats to Hoyer's title may come from the second-seeded
Olympic bronze medalist from Malaysia, Rashid Sidek, if he can
survive a probable meeting with Arbi in the third round, and from
China's fourth-seeded Sun Jun, who beat Hoyer to win the Dutch
Open.

Doubles

Indonesia is favorite for two other titles, the men's and
mixed doubles, and could be in contention in all five finals.

The new men's partnership of Sigit and Chandra Wijaya,
apparently being groomed for gold in the Sydney Olympics, are the
top seeds, though the more likely winners appear to be their more
famous compatriots, the titleholders and Olympic champions Ricky
Subagja and Rexy Mainaky.

The well-established unorthodoxies of Trikus Heryanto and
Minarti Timur, who sometimes defy the coaching manuals by playing
comfortably with the woman at the back instead of the net -- are
the mixed top seeds and have three Danish pairs as their nearest
challengers.

But the hottest mixed favorites are not Indonesian. They are
the top-seeded titleholders from China, Ge Fei and Gu Jun, who
appear to have moved even further ahead of the field since
winning at the Olympics last August.