Last Monday I flew to Birmingham by KLM for the 103rd edition of the Yonex All England. The Dutch Badminton Federation had decided not to participate this year, but I think that you should always play this event provided you have the possibility and your ranking allows you to. So I choose to go there on my own expenses. Why? Because this is a Premier Super Series tournament where the best players of the world compete and where you can get a lot of inspiration by just training there and to walk around behind the scenes. But the most important thing is that you learn to play under the extraordinary circumstances of a giant stadium like the National Indoor Arena.
As we were entirely left on our own devices we had to deal with logistic and administrative matters and with finding accommodation. So we had to arrange our transport and our training courts ourselves. But we also had to visit the managers meeting which was fun for a time but I can imagine that coaches get fed up with it when they have to hear more or less the same thing every week all over again. But you HAVE to be present otherwise you get fined. Such a meeting is about players who have withdrawn, about advertisements on shirts, about the new rules for the back of shirts where your name, country and sponsor logos are mentioned and a lot more “nitty-gritty” More than once I heard coaches sigh deeply and look around bored stiff, but I enjoyed myself.
For our small team there were no changes which meant for me qualification matches for the men’s doubles on Tuesday and mixed doubles in the main tournament on Wednesday. In the men’s doubles Dave and I played a pair from Belgium. As I wrote before we didn’t have high expectations because of Dave’s physical condition. Too many things went wrong in this match. In fact we shouldn’t have played in this discipline under these circumstances but we had made our flight and hotel reservations long before. We lost the match in three games and of course this shouldn’t have happened. Still there was an advantage for me because I had at least an one hour court experience.
The next day the main tournament started and our mixed double was scheduled at 8.40 P.M. In last years edition this could have meant playing at 12.40 A.M. but also here they learn and this time there were 5 courts i.s.o. 4. So right on time we entered the Arena for our match versus the French Careme and Fontaine who are ranked 15 places higher than we are. The past weeks they showed to be in good shape in Moscow and Mülheim. But we were well prepared. We had a tactical “fighting plan” and we both felt that we were ready for the match. The entire match we were in the lead and by serving well we could maintain our offensive playing. We won the match with 12 and 15 qualifying ourselves for the next round.
On Thursday our opponents were the numbers 7 of the World ranking, the Indonesians Rijal and Susanto. Wherever you play the Indonesian, fans are everywhere and also this time. With flags, cheering and applauding they were encouraging their countrymen. Until 10-11 in the first game we were well matched. Our tactics worked out well and we didn’t have to change our way of playing. But after the interval the Asians adjusted their tactics. We lost quite some points in a row and we lost the game. In the second game our opponents took a quick lead. We did play a number of good rallies but as we felt afterwards still too few. We lost the match with 12 and 14. I was quite disappointed and I regretted that we didn’t manage to take advantage of the good start we made the day before and consequently didn’t get the best out of ourselves. Anyway we were knocked out and we were just in time to catch our flight back home. Next day it was training at Papendal as usual.
Naturally I try to follow the All England matches on my laptop and I study and analyse the games as much as possible. Yesterday I really enjoyed watching the Poles Mateusiak and Zieba giving the Indonesian title defenders a really hard time again. Mateusiak, 37 years of age and still very fit, fast and explosive and with his game intelligence almost unrivalled. Much to my surprise our Indonesian opponents in the quarter finals defeated the numbers one of the world. They are in the semi finals today. Conclusion: Rijal and Susanto are in excellent shape. At this tournament Indonesia is doing very well in the mixed doubles with three pairs in today`s semi finals. I am looking forward to watch it again!!
Tags: badminton, jorrit de ruiter, KLM, Papendal, Yonex, Yonex All England