As seen at the German Open: Bao - NS8000 Hafiz - NS7000 Lee - NS7000 (switched back to MP88 in his match against Hafiz but it didn't help him much) Gao - NS7000 Cai - Ti10 (wonder why he switched back from AT800 DE?)
OMG Hafiz stopped using his trusty Ti-6. What is the Malasian National Team going to do with the masses of Ti-6 they purchased??
Aha, so this confirms that most pros use a particular yonex model because yonex requires them to do so as part of sponsorship and not because they like the racquet. Before NS7000 came out, all of them use AT, and before AT came out, most of them use MP 99 or 100. I recalled we used to debate whether AT 800 OF or DE is better by counting the pros that uses it. Now they use NS7000?? Wierd coz NS are head light and AT are head heavy. So if the pros use a racquet by their own preferences, they won't switch that fast considering the AT and NS are opposites. I have a friend that still uses MP 99 even if he owns 2 AT models. He claims MP 99 is still better than AT, the fact that most pros use AT is because of their sponsorship agreement with yonex... guess he is right.
it might be true for some players i.e. Lin Dan, Taufik, etc. But take a look at Xia, he won the last world championship with classic Cab 20. Maybe due to sponsorship deal, he keep changing back and forth from cab 20 to at700. same goes with chen hong, switch from ti10 to at700, and again to MP99. as peter gade, he was strugling until he settle with mp88. I believe players do have their own right to choose which particular racket suit them well. as for Hafiz, he's been using ti6 since forever. maybe due to sponsorship deal or some advise he received, he decided to test ns8k. very interesting. pre 2005, malaysian team sponsored by gosen except for roslin and hafiz. but as everyone knows, most of the top players still use yonex i.e. choong han 21sp, lcw mp88. oh, another thing, malaysian team highly likely will be sponsored by Yonex from 2005 onwards, though no official announcment yet to be made. i might be totally wrong, but hey it just my 2 cents though.
they couldn't use the AT before it came out, so that's why they were using MP...same for NS and AT... jonas says that he got to choose which racquet he uses, although even if he is not, yonex might have a secrecy clause or something i guess
