Congratulations to the SBA for staying true to form. Bravo.

The report:

As I had expected and predicted in my previous post (Where are your principles, SBA?),  the Singapore Badminton Association decided to cut its suspension of shuttler Hendra Wijaya by a day so that he can play in the World Championships in Paris. The report from The Straits Times is below.

I guess this is what happens when you throw in your lot with the Foreign Talent Scheme, investing huge amounts of money to develop and groom shuttlers from other countries and turning them into naturalised citizens.

Because you’ve become so dependent on them for success, and because your KPIs for more government funding is dependent on their successes, you are willing to throw your principles out of the window just to get the much-sought after results.

I wonder how the SBA would have reacted if the shuttler in question was a local-born chap who is ranked lower than Hendra, with little chance of being selected for or going far in the World Championships.

Would we then see the national sports association keeping the suspension and then puffing up its chest for all to admire its tough stance on poor discipline?

After seeing how the SBA rushed to get China-born Huang Chao citizenship in January so that he can play in the Youth Olympic Games, instead of considering the three other local-born shuttlers in their YOG provisional squad (which now seems a sham on hindsight),  and bearing in mind the Zheng Qingjin fiasco two years back, I know what I would expect.

Yours in sport

Singapore Sports Fan

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  The report:

Singapore shuttlers in all five events

(The Straits Times, 23 Aug 2010)

 By Lin Xinyi

 SINGAPORE has sent an eight-member squad to the World Badminton Championships, starting in Paris today.

It will be represented in all five events, including the men’s doubles, after the Singapore Badminton Association (SBA) confirmed that Hendra Wijaya will be available to play.

In May, he was handed a three-month suspension from all tournaments that was to end on Aug 24.

But an unofficial two-week suspension before the start of his ban, coupled with good attitude during training, will see him play in a tournament a day earlier.

Hendra and his brother Hendri Kurniawan Saputra will face Germany’s Michael Fuchs and Ingo Kindervater today.

Ashton Chen and Derek Wong will compete in the men’s singles, while Xing Aiying is Singapore’s sole representative in the women’s singles.

Yao Lei will feature in the women’s doubles with Shinta Mulia Sari and the mixed doubles with Chayut Triyachart.

Singapore’s best hopes lie in the women’s doubles where Shinta and Yao Lei are the 11th seeds.

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Matthew Goh could have been a potential bronze medallist at the IAAF World Juniors

The men’s long jump final at the ongoing IAAF World Junior Championships in Moncton, Canada, was concluded last night.

South Africa’s Luvo Manyonga won it with 7.99m. Eusebio Caraces of Spain was second with 7.90m while Stewart Taylor of Canada took the bronze with 7.63m.

You can read their post-competition interviews here

It makes you wonder whether young Matthew Goh could have snared a podium finsih if he had been allowed to defer his national service and take part in the World Juniors.

After all, he did set his national record of 7.62m at last December’s South-east Asia Games, and under national jumps coach Valeri Obidko, has been known to improve on his distances by 0.2m every year.

Matthew’s father did appeal for his son to be allowed to compete at the World Juniros and to enlist for national service after that, but Mindef turned it down because “the circumstances were not exceptional to warrant granting of deferment.”

You can read Deputy Prime Minister Teo Chee Hean’s response to Nominated Member of Parliament Joscelin Yeo on Mindef’s reasons for not granting Matthew’s request for a three-month deferment here.

Yes, one can always argue that one can never tell if Matthew can set a new national record at the World Juniors, or even finish among the top-three. But then again, I wouldn’t have bet against him doing so given his annual rate of improvement, and the young man’s steely determination.

This is another example of us shooting ourselves in the foot when it comes to Singapore sports. We will never know until we try, and yet we are not willing to give it a try.

And I guess this is why Singapore sport can never go far.

And when we fail to reach the heights, we lament, beat our breasts and complain that our sportsmen don’t have the hunger or the talent. And then we proceed to flood our sports with foreign exports.

And when these naturalised citizens go on to win top honours, and when the general public doesn’t quite share in the manufactured joy, the authorities then slam the people for being ungracious, and for failing to recognise the sacrficies and hard work that these naturalised citizens have put in to achieve sporting glory for Singapore.

Well, I am sure Matthew was also willing top put in the sacrifices and hours of hard work too.

He just wasn’t given the chance because “the circumstances were not exceptional enough to warrant the granting of deferment”.

Bollocks.

Yours in sport

Singapore Sports Fan

Newsflash: Singapore beats China 3-1 in World Team Table Tennis final

Singapore created sporting history this evening when it stunned China to win the 50^th World Team Table Tennis Championships’ women’s title.

The achievement in Moscow is Singapore’s best table tennis result on the world stage to date and also marks the first time the Republic has managed to beat its biggest rival.

Singapore finished second to China at the Beijing Olympics in 2008 and at last year’s Asian Championships and World Team Cup.

But this World Team Table Tennis Championships also provided the best opportunity for the Republic to beat China.

This is because the world No. 1 was competing without two of its former No. 1s – Zhang Yining and Wang Nan, who had dominated the last three Olympics and six World Team competitions.

Although the Chinese had replaced Zhang and Wang with current world No. 1 Liu Shiwen, 18, and world No. 4 Ding Ning, 19, the two teenagers lack experience and were making their World Team debuts. As such, there were fears about their ability to deliver the goods under pressure on such a major stage.

Indeed, those fears materialised tonight.

Singapore, which had spent 35 days in centralised training in Taiwan for this tournament,  drew first blood when top player Feng Tianwei defeated Ding 3-2.

(8-11, 3-11, 11-8, 11-9, 11-9). But it was Wang Yuegu’s stunning 3-1 ((11-7, 11-8, 2-11, 12-10) of Liu that made everyone sitting at home in Singapore front of their television sets sit up.

Singapore was leading 2-0 and suddenly an upset was looking like a increasing possibility. But China prevented a 0-3 whitewash when Guo Yan overcame Sun Beibei 3-1 (6-11, 11-6, 11-4, 11-6) to reduce the deficit.

And so the match hung on the clash of the world’s top two players. It did not help matters that Feng had not beaten Liu in four encounters prior to this.

But in the end, Feng clinched the world title for Singapore when she overcame Liu 3-2 (11-7, 14-16, 11-7, 9-11, 11-7) in a nerve-wracking encounter.

The Singapore Sports Fan would like to congratulate the Singapore team on their success and for finally overcoming their inability to beat China.

Yours in sport

Singapore Sports Fan