Legal height of shuttlecock's impact during serving?

The whole shuttle must be below the server's waist, often interpreted as the lowest part of the lowest rib, but the naval is also a good and in my opinion an easier means to measure this when considering it for yourself.

 

Let's do away with the hearsay and have a look at the actual laws:

So first of all, in Badminton terms, waist means something different than what non-umpires or the average medical professional would expect. To get a more lucid understanding, let's remove the term:

When your coach told you about the belly button, they weren't misleading you, just simplifying even more. For most people, the difference is only a couple cms, and your coach's mental model ensures that the serve is correct even if you go up a little more. If you have an abnormally positioned belly button or rib cage, the difference may matter.



So now why don't we see way more faults being called on professional players who are serving above the lowest rib? That's a complicated topic. I'll try to outline some factors here.

For one, umpires and service judges are asked not to call faults if they are unsure[sup]RTTO §4.4[/sup], so they will be a little bit more lenient.

Without high-speed cameras, you also often see the position where the server is holding the shuttle, not the one where they are hitting it. When I recorded "problematic" players at a tournament, I was quite surprised to see that the height difference can be quite substantial even on national/regional levels.

Additionally, virtually all pros hold the shuttle sideways when serving, thereby gaining a couple of cms on most low-level players who hold it upright.

Umpires may not see everything, or be unsure because of the angle from up high - that's why we have service judges in high-level tournaments. In practice, virtually all games with umpires are played without service judges - it's just that these games are rarely reported on. So players and umpires get used to rare fault calls, and it's hard for service judges to toughen up.

Some umpires and service judges are also lenient because they want to keep the flow of the game. In fact, they're even backed up by a rule:

A particularly strict service judge can easily be accused of "ruining" a game.

In fact, pressure by the audience, fans, the players, coaches, the public, and other umpires (hopefully not the referees) can easily dissuade service judges from calling faults where warranted. It is not a rare sight to see players calling for the referee when their serves are faulted, even in cases where video analysis shows an obviously correct decision.

A fellow umpire - and an experienced one at that - once told me not to fault men because they would talk back! Although discouraged from fraternizing with the players, many umpires enjoy umpiring precisely because they get to enjoy high-level Badminton from up close. I was once being told that a strict policy "wouldn't lead to me making a lot of friends" in the rather small German high-level Badminton world.

Often, coaches join in. After I saw high-level players being surprised at fault calls, I dug up the videos where their coaches explain to other coaches how to train for serves. In the video, they said not to worry about height as long as it's below the shoulders: "Go to the limit. It's a fault if the service judge says fault".

As mentioned above, there is also considerable variation in leniency among umpires. Quite a lot of umpires do think that it's within the spirit of the game not to call faults unless they think the players gain an advantage. In extreme cases, this means some umpires may allow everything under the shoulders. A coach told me once that after they complained to the umpire when playing in another region, the umpire told him that his players could serve illegally high as well and so nobody would gain an advantage!

Players and coaches rarely complain about overly high serves unless they have problems dealing with the serves. At high levels, they'd probably be able to consistently deal with a serve from shoulder height, so they often don't complain when the opponents serve incorrectly.

At regional and sometimes national levels, there are also a lot of inexperienced umpires. For example, in Germany, clubs are pressed to provide an umpire once per year - otherwise they get fined upwards of 100€ a year. This leads to some umpires who are not in it for the umpiring and content with just counting. Since they only umpire once a year of even once every two years (the absolute minimum here), they may not even know how to correctly call a service fault! I once overheard an umpire with five years of experience asking in the umpire's lounge what the gesture and procedure for a height service fault call would be! In discussion during the last games of a day or tournament, it's not rare to hear especially these umpires saying that they did not give a single service fault call.



All in all, a lot of factors pressure the service judges to be quite lenient. Although corrected by the rules and idealistic umpires (and sometimes referees), this tends to be a self-reinforcing process:

1. On average, umpires are lenient
2. Players get used to the new unofficial height
3. Strict umpires get pressured into being more lenient - it's unheard of that players or coaches contact the referee because of overly lenient calls
4. As a result of strict umpires becoming more lenient, the average height goes upwards, leading to 1.

 

^ Interesting...

But my theory why service judges are now getting stricter and calling so many more service faults now since the past few tournaments is that this is the pre Olympic qualifying period. This happened also in the period leading up to London OG 2012.

BWF wants to make sure every letter of the law is followed and not broken.

Which brings me to wonder, how many more tournaments is it going to take some of these chronic high serve offenders to correct their serves, eg. LYD, YYS, ZN, Ahsan/Setiawan...

 

The easy way is the navel, But since we can't see it, may use the elbow. That is more visible and easy.

 

At the recent NZ open, a certain doubles match was somewhat non-event. Coming off court, a fellow official made a remark that the match was ruined by the overly strict service judge. I dont agree. A fault is a fault is a fault. Its non negotiable, whatever the circumstances. Umpires should do their job regardless of whom they are faulting. Then, there are some jellybacks out there!

 

The men's doubles final at the Indo Open was a good showcase of how to call service faults.

IMHO players are taking the mickey out of the rules and many are now serving up near their armpits. It's a complete joke, and NOW because the pros are doing it, like the sheeple they are, so too are amateurs and club players.

I think the answer is simple - have a double fault system, just like tennis.

That includes serving, too. You basically get two chances to get the shuttle in to play.

Flick serve goes long? *Fault*, second service. Struck above the waist? *Fault*, second service.

Thoughts?

 

Hahaha...........I have to agree with you on this. OG by the rules cause it's the example for all to see worldwide. Super Series - Pro games, can be a little less strict. Afterall, people pay to see their stars in action. Go by the book and fault them endlessly and see who will be the end receiver of water bottles!

Having said that. Any games where $$$ is involved , especially sponsorship big time , somehow things seems to move that way.................that;s the reality in life unfortunately.

 

Ofcourse there is doubt, but when the serve get ridiculous high, it should be faulted. And I think the serving faulting isn't strict, it's just that the players are so used to doing high serves without faulted.

And it doesn't ruin the game, rather it fixes the game. So many club and social players are serving very high because they copy the pros, so it's good that they atleast know and see that a high serve isn't allowed.

 

This won't work:

• Most importantly, it would lead to an increase in fault calls. That's the opposite of what we want to achieve!
• Faulting second serves would likely lead to even greater discussions.
• Game time would get longer while actual playing time would stay the same, i.e. less Badminton per minute.
• The rules for play with and without umpires would be different.
• In general, the rules would become more complex, thus repelling potential spectators and players.

 

Yep. I noticed an increase of enforcement of service faults called in 2011-2012 leading up to the London OG games.

But not as much as 7(!) service faults in a match on 1 player alone (LYD in recent Sudirman cup) and something like 6 on Shin BakCheol just a few days ago in INA open final.

However all those calls were obviously correct and valid, as slow mo replays show them to be serving from chest height.

 

None of these things are a problem in tennis. I'd argue that there's even less issues and less flaunting of the rules than there is in badminton.

 

That's because tennis doesn't have vague subjective rules like the vague location of the lowest rib service height as in badminton.

Not to even mention the angle of the racket...

 

The service rules in badminton are so restrictive that they damage the game itself. The simple solution is quite easy, just be much less restrictive and throw away the many silly service rules!

The service rules evolve into the complication as seen today because I think some nation developed some kind of spinning service technic in the 1980s that was quite effective, then the sporting body were starting to tweak & implement various rules over times to combat this effectiveness. It's akin to that what happened in TT, the sporting body highly regulates the bat, the ways of service etc but eventually they give up that the various regulations implemented still can't prevent the excellence of some particular nation in that related sport

The key solution in the badminton's service rules: they must remove the subjectivity and relativity aspects of the whatsoever waist height stipulated in this "the vague location of the lowest rib service height" unless badminton players all play in topless (with women are wearing bikini only) LOL

It's really pathetic to see the sporting body keeps on maintaining the subjective & relative card that may affect the match outcome and for sure interrupt and spoil the match!

Btw, the size of tennis court & ball differ much from badminton; in terms of the needed accuracy and concentration, there is no such comparison between the two!

 

Tennis players could get every serve in if they wanted to, but having the double fault system has allowed the game to evolve the way that it has.

How are the current badminton rules making the sport evolve in a positive way? They're not!

You're absolutely correct that relativity and subjectivity must be removed, and that's why we're having this conversation, but 'throwing away silly service rules' is not a solution. The current rules must be replaced by other rules.

For example - I'm fairly tall. If I was allowed to serve any way I like, I'd be standing on the service line and I'd be striking the shuttle literally on top of the net. Right at your head. Good luck returning those.

If you want less rules, you'll then have no choice but to move the service line back, which would mean modifying every court on Earth.

 

They are not complicated, that's literally it:

That is all we are discussing about. Seems fairly simple to me.

That's rule §9.1.5. Rule §9.1.5 works. How do I know that? I've never seen that fault called, and have never called it myself either. §9.1.5 is the paragon of a great rule: It excluded a shot that would make the game extremely boring (because nearly all serves would be a winner), and players stopped playing that shot.

If you were to remove all service rules, games would be extremely boring; every professional would master kill serves. Therefore, the coin toss would decide the game, and we would report on any game not ending 21:0 21:0.

Therefore, you must suggest alternative rules. BWF tried that (§9.1.6.2), but theirs didn't really work either. What is your suggestion?

 

Just answer all in brief:

* REMOVE the subjectivity and relativity aspects. I did NOT mean to remove ALL service rules; just make the rules the clear cut objective -- NO ambiguity, please; and they can just make them less restrictive; allow more improvisations there, but set the FIXED height. And REMOVE the angle matter here.

I mentioned earlier in other threads, why don't be less restrictive in service rules to allow players have more improvisations on services, just regard those improvisations as part of player's skill...any player can learn if certain method is deemed as effective!

Just have these kinds of thoughts as a PRINCIPLE that improvisations in service is part of player's skill; hence, all the kinds of service rules must be set to minimum and take care the basic matters only (e.g.: height but not angle); but again and again, just discard the subjectivity & relativity part in the service rules. Leave no room to official's subjective and relative judgements upon the service.

And why don't include the service into the Hawk-Eye's coverage so player can challenge the calls as needed??? It's really an easy point giveaway in case of service fault call.

* Set a FIXED height instead, or something relative to the height of the net, a height that even still caters the need of a player as short as Akane Yamaguchi for instance (no insult here, she's just famous figure but her height is good for reference... definitely not a height that player as tall as Mads PIELER KOLDING will reap as an unfair benefit).

* "Originally Posted by Laws of Badminton, §9.1.6 (simplified)
In a correct service, the whole shuttle shall be below the lowest part of the server's bottom rip at the instant of being hit by the server's racket."

HOW the assistant to umpire is able see clearly BEHIND the shirt "the lowest part of the server's bottom rip" ???

* "How are the current badminton rules making the sport evolve in a positive way? They're not!"
NO, they do NOT grow the badminton more positively, instead the reverse is true! The repeated calls of service faults are disgusting indeed!

How viewers will enjoy a match being ruined by the repeated fault calls on service??? I do not enjoy it all.

 

The rules aren't ambiguous - If the service judge would be able to stop time at the serve, it would be quite easy to determine whether the serve is valid or not. The problem is that humans must decide in a split second.

So instead of asking for changes of the rules, you could indeed just delegate to HawkEye. At first, that would almost certainly mean way more service faults though.

The way I understand it, without any restriction on angle you could make spinning serves. After a short period where everybody scrambles to learn those, we'd have way shorter rallies, most of them ending after return of serve or even receivers missing the shuttle. I (and most audience members) prefer longer rallies.

The net is at a fixed height, so there's no need to complicate things.

BWF tried that. The problem is that Kolding has to basically serve at knee-height.

Because we want long rallies, or more precisely, want most rallies to consist of more than serve and return of serve.

Anatomically, the elbow is at the same height. As I wrote above, the main problem is not that service judges cannot judge the height. I suggest simply asking any umpire in your club or region - it's far less of a problem than you imagine.

I don't get the problem with a service fault. It's a player's mistake like any other, and way easier to avoid than, say, weak shots from the backhand or insufficient stamina.

If BWF and the referees stay the course as is for some time, players will learn to serve correctly. Those who cannot learn to serve correctly will simply lose their games and drop out of tournaments.

 

Good post!