No decision made on new badminton scoring system

Novan Iman Santosa, The Jakarta Post, Guangzhou, China

The International Badminton Federation (IBF) failed Sunday to make the long-awaited decision on the new scoring system during its Annual General Meeting (AGM)'s plenary meeting in Guangzhou, China.

In the past year the IBF has been experimenting with the new seven-point, best-of-five scoring system replacing the old 15- point, best-of-three system.

The badminton world's preference has been divided ever since.

"IBF members and delegates deliberated the results and proposals of the new scoring system but failed to make a unanimous decision during the plenary meeting," IBF president Korn Dabbaransi told reporters during a press conference.

"Therefore the delegates agreed to let the IBF Council discuss and decide the proposals."

The new system was proposed by European countries to attract more sponsors and TV coverage as the new score system enables more breaks during a match to air advertisements.

There is also an expectation that badminton will become more aggressive with shuttlers playing faster than in the old system. There was also speculation that the European side wanted to break Asia's domination by playing faster matches.

Both more TV coverage and more attacking matches were expected to attract more spectators in a quest to gain more popularity for badminton.

Korn also said that Denmark and England had submitted a third scoring system of nine-point, best-of-five to be considered by the IBF Council.

"The Council will take the final and official decision regarding which scoring system to be used on May 18 as authorized by the delegates," he said.

"Our members clearly stated that there has been enough time given for the experiment. They insisted that the decision must be taken here."

IBF chief executive Neil Cameroon said there had been mixed reactions from various broadcasting companies on the new scoring system.

"Some of them reported that the number of spectators increased while other organizations were not so sure with the new system," he told reporters.

"I must admit that there has been no increase on commercial or sponsorships revenue nor did we expect it. It requires a longer time."

There were 110 countries out of IBF's 141 members who attended the AGM which also discussed other issues, such as international representations.

The AGM will continue with meetings discussing various matters until May 18.

IBF members agreed to increase by one-year to a total of three years the period a defecting player must wait before they can represent another country.

Meanwhile for the individual events, the waiting period has been also extended from one year to two years.

"England has also submitted a proposal that a shuttler should be a passport holder of the country he or she is wishing to defend and not just a resident," said Korn.

During the meeting, the delegates also named three vice presidents and three continental representatives and elected six additional members from seven candidates for the IBF Council. Currently there are 24 council members.

Eight-times All England champion Rudy Hartono from Indonesia was elected, with all available 202 votes cast in his favor. He was followed by former Chinese great Li Lingwei who got 200 votes.