So I moved to my new residence in a whole new town and state. Joined a badminton club. No one even knew my name yet, much less where I grew up (which is Indonesia by the way). By the way, I'm not Indonesian, just spent a vast portion of my life there. I don't look Indonesian at all, and you'll see in the next paragraph why I'm making this point. I played for a couple of days, and when I finally got introduced to the person who was in charge of the club, without a wink in her eye she guessed I played in Indonesia a lot! WOW! Do different countries really have their own unique style of playing badminton, can some of you tell where a person played by looking at them play, or is this lady in charge of my badminton club just super-human?
Well, if I saw the player using three different models of racquets in the same game, I would know his name would have to be Shaun, Byro or Tony.
Well at the risk of being mocked/ridiculed/roasted etc.I have the same experience.I have played singles with guests and somehow I could guess they were Indonesians. Remember the speed and power game of today was invented by the Indonesians in 50's and 60's by Ferry Sonneville, then Rudy Hartono, Tang Xian Fu, Hou Chia Jiang and Fang Kai Xiang,the last three migrated to China after 1966. Some of the hallmarks on INA singles players include economy of movement, speed of execution of strokes, serving styles,and particularly overhead technique,heavy emphasis on racquet skills and timing of smashes. A lot of INA players styles are modelled after Rudy, even if the posting was a hoax there may be a small element of truth.Some Indonesian techniques are unique, that was why the Korean doubles were defeated by Chandra and Sigit even when everyone thought that Korean techniques were invincible some time ago.
I think Tang, Hou at least returned to China before 1966. In early 80's I played against a former Chinese National doubles player and he mentioned that he won the 1962 Chinese National Double Championship - Tang and Hou did not compete because they were playing outside the country. I also believe Hou won the China National singles in 1963 and Tang won the following year.
