THE Sudirman Cup, which begins in Qingdao, China today, is not a major worry for national singles coach Rashid Sidek but the declining standards of Malaysian back-up players compared to rivals China and Indonesia, is.
Rashid, yesterday preparing the players for the Sudirman Cup, lamented on the negative attitude shown by back-up shuttlers who don't try hard enough to follow the footsteps of World No 1 Lee Chong Wei.
Rashid said the other countries face the same problem but their back-up players are much better and he is concerned about the bleak future after Chong Wei retires.
"If you look at all the other countries, they are also suffering like Malaysia in the sense that their current top players such as Lin Dan in China and Taufik Hidayat in Indonesia are superior to the back-up or second ranked players.
"The difference is, the back-up players in those countries are consistently beating our back-up players," said Rashid.
"This is very worrying indeed and I hope our players look to Chong Wei as a source of inspiration. Some of the back-up players need to change their attitude and thinking as they are lagging behind Chong Wei.
"This is something we must address and I hope the players realise that if they want to succeed, they have to work harder then they are doing now.
"He (Chong Wei) has shown that a Malaysian can survive being at the top of the world rankings for a long time and consistently win big tournaments. Now it is up to them to emulate his feats."
Malaysia will be heavily dependent on Chong Wei in the Sudirman Cup as back-up shuttler Chong Wei Feng doesn't stand a chance against others.
Malaysia may not even take the risk of fielding him against Russia as they must secure the tie tomorrow in Group B to qualify for the quarter-finals.
It will get tougher against Indonesia as Chong Wei is the only one who can beat Simon Santoso to confirm a point in the tie on Wednesday. Should Malaysia beat both Russia and Indonesia, they will be in a better position to reach the semi-finals.
This is because Malaysia can avoid meeting top seeds China, South Korea or Japan in the quarter-finals if they can top Group B.
Should they lose to Indonesia, they may even face China in the quarter-finals and that will be the end of the road for the Malaysia who reached the semi-finals in Guangzhou two years ago.
Meanwhile, Russian team manager Stepin Maxim has already conceded beating Malaysia or Indonesia but he sees badminton has a great future in his country as the sport will soon be part of the schooling education system as one of the main curriculum activities.
"The sport is growing and we have more and more youngsters taking up badminton back in Russia. It may not be as popular as tennis is at the moment, but given time, I'm sure badminton will be just as welcome around the country," said Maxim
"The game received a big boost when we qualified for Group 1 of this year's Sudirman Cup. I'm confident it will continue to grow, especially with the latest incentives put into place to teach schoolchildren badminton.
"Anna Kournikova and Maria Sharapova helped glamorise tennis as they are very beautiful. Russian badminton players are also not bad looking so that is good," added Maxim with a laugh.
"That could help with the game's popularity."
"We are placed last out of the 12 teams in the top tier. As such, we have to be realistic about our chances. Obviously, we know it won't be easy to beat either Indonesia or Malaysia but we will try our best and a lot will depend on our women players."
Team like Russia have started making huge strides and Malaysia wouldn't want to be in a situation where some of national back-up shuttlers start losing to their players in future.
Courtesy of New Straits Times
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