RI wins women's badminton gold

RI wins women's badminton gold

SHAH ALAM, Malaysia (AP): Longtime champion Indonesia
reasserted its dominance of women's team badminton at the
Southeast Asian Games Tuesday, beating Thailand 3-1 for the gold
medal.

Although badminton standards in the world's fourth most
populous nation have slipped a little since its heyday of the
early 1990s, Indonesia has not lost the title since 1977.
Malaysia and Vietnam took bronze.

Shaking off her poor form in Monday's semifinals, Indonesia's
Lydia Djaelawijaya, the women's singles top seed, beat Thailand's
Sujitra in the opening singles 11-7, 11-2.

The doubles pair of Deyana Lomban and Vita Marissa put the
Indonesians 2-0 up with a 15-10, 15-6 victory over Saralee
Thoungthongkam and Satinee of Thailand.

A gutsy singles performance from Salakjit Ponsana, 17, put the
Thais back in contention.

After losing the first set 11-6 and winning the second 11-2
against Yuli Marfuah, Thailand's second-ranked singles player
fought back from 0-6 to clinch the decider 11-8, briefly
silencing the spirited Indonesian supporters.

But a new doubles pairing of Emma Ermawati and Eny Erlangga,
20, making her debut for the Indonesian women's team, powered
past Duangchong and Kunchala of Thailand 15-7, 15-8 to clinch the
gold.

"I think it's a special day for the Indonesian team," said
Christian Hadinata, the team manager. "It's great for morale too
as we look forward to the individual matches."

Christian was especially happy with Eny's performance as she
prepares for the singles. But he tipped Lydia, the world No. 10,
to become champion if she keeps playing as well as she did
Tuesday.

Sompol Kookasemkit, the Thai team manager, was stoic about the
defeat.

"Our team were the underdogs and we tried our best. The first
singles was disappointing because she (Sujitra) was out of form,"
the former top badminton player said.

But the determined performance of young prospect Salakjit was
a bonus. She will also contest the singles, starting Wednesday.

"In the future we hope she can do well. Right now she's still
quite young, still growing," he said.