SINGAPORE — Three of Indonesia’s top men’s singles players withdrew from the Li-Ning Singapore Open yesterday but the organisers are unfazed about their eleventh-hour pull-out.
Sony Dwi Kuncoro (world No 7 and 2010 Singapore Open winner), Dionysious Hayum Rumbaka (No 24) and Simon Santoso (No 26 and 2008 runner-up) are giving the US$200,000 SuperSeries tournament a miss, citing fatigue and injury.
The triple Indonesian whammy means that Indonesia will have only Tommy Sugiarto (world No 20) as their only flag-bearer in the men’s singles. “They are all injured,” said Indonesia’s coach Joko Suprianto, pointing to his head.
The withdrawals follow that of Chinese two-time Olympic and four-time world champion Lin Dan, who announced his decision to skip the tournament last week because of injury.
Several other withdrawals were also announced at the team’s managers’ meeting yesterday.
World No 1 doubles pair and top seeds Wang Xiaoli and Yu Yang of China, who finished second at the recent Indonesian Open, have pulled out, along with Ma Jin and Tang Jinhua (world No 6). Both pairs cited injuries for their absence.
Despite the pull-outs, the Singapore Badminton Association (SBA) said there is still enough talent to spice up the tournament, which begins today and ends on Sunday. It also remains upbeat about ticket sales.
“Even with the late withdrawals from Indonesia, we still have 70 per cent of the world’s top players taking part,” said SBA Chief Executive Bobby Lee.
“Things are also looking good as far as ticket sales are concerned. In fact, we are going to perform better than last year and we are getting close to achieving the 2011 figures — an estimated total of 30,000 for the entire five-day tournament.”
Meanwhile, Derek Wong, Singapore’s top-ranked male shuttler, will be in action in the qualifying rounds today. The 24-year-old world No 48 faces Malaysia’s Zulfadli Zulkifli. If he wins, he will face defending champion Boonsak Ponsana of Thailand in the first round. DAN GUEN CHIN
(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) {return;} js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "http://connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, "script", "facebook-jssdk"));
No comments:
Post a Comment