Hello, who is going te watch the Belgium Open? Does someboy know who plays there? I hope it will be good because we never get badminton on tv here :-(
I'll a there the whole week as a voluneer. The players should be announced on the website during the following weeks. I'll see you there
from www.badmintonliga.be On this years Yonex Belgian International we are welcoming players from 25 different countries representing 4 different continents: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, England, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Guatemala, Iran, Ireland, Luxemburg, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Peru, Portugal, Russia, Scotland, Slovenia, Switzerland, Sweden, Ukraine and Zambia. Amongst the participants we can find many European and World Top players. A short overview. In the Mens Singles we are welcoming over 100 inscriptions : Bjorn Joppien from Germany, finalist of last years edition is the favourite in the Mens Singles event. He is currently ranked nr. 5 on the European Ranking and nr. 17 on the World Ranking. He can expect the though competition of amongst others Kasper Oedum of Denmark (ER nr. 10, WR 29), Ville Lang of Finland (ER 11 WR 33), Roman Spitko of Germany (ER 15 WR 44) and Petr Koukal of Czech Republic (ER 16 WR 49) with his compatriot Jan Frölich (ER 17 WR 50). Dangerous outsiders will be Simon Maunoury (WR72) and Jean-Michel Lefort (WR 98) of France, Bo Rafn of Denmark (WR 79), Erwin Kehlhoffner of France (WR 86), Scott Evans of Ireland (WR 80), Jan Vondra of Czech Republic (WR 87), Pedro Yang of Guatemala (WR74), Mehrabi Kaveh of Iran (WR 91), Pukov Stanislav of Russia (WR 81) and Rune Massing of the Netherlands (WR 99). In the Mens Singles this results in 16 shuttlers out of the Top 100 in the World. The Belgian honour will be defended on the tournament by amongst others David Jaco (WR 157), Lionel Warnotte (WR 249) and talented youngster Yuhan Tan (WR 256). The Ladies Singles promises to be a real top event. More then 65 Ladies are inscribed and the top of the world is represented in the name of Pi Hongyan of France (ER 2 and WR 5). She will meet the competition of 17 players out of the Top 100 of the World. Not in the least Petra Overzier of Germany (ex-European Youth Champion and nr 19 in the World (ER 8)), Ella Karachkova of Russia (WR 24 ER 10), Susan Hughes of Scotland (WR 25 ER 11) and Sara Persson of Sweden (WR 41 ER 16) will be amongst the favourites for a place in the semi finals. Outsiders are Elisabeth Cann (ex top 20 and current WR 51) and Jill Pittard (WR 55) of England, Rachel Van Cutsen of the Netherlands (WR 59), Perrine Lebuhanic (WR 72) of France. Also Nathalie Descamps of Belgium (WR 99, due to a period of inactivity to finish her studies) will be again in a great shape to repeat her good result of last years edition where she has beaten amongst others Nicole Grether (WR 51) of Germany. In the doubles events there is an extremely strong field of competitors: The mens doubles will meet Wouter Claes and Frederic Mawet of Belgium (ER 12 WR 30), Michael Fuchs and Roman Spitko of Germany (ER 5 WR 17), Popov and Stoyanov (ER 7 WR 19) and Kehlhoffner-Lefort (ER 15 WR 38) of France. In the Ladies doubles we have 13 teams of the top 100 of the World in the draw. Nr 5 of the European Ranking Johanna Persson and Eline Bergblom of Sweden (WR15) will take up the competition of Vislova-Sorokina (ER 7 WR 29) and Ananina-Russkikh (ER 8 WR 30) of Russia, Rahmawati-Eymard of France (ER 9 WR 31), Bankier-Mason of Scotland (ER 11 WR 38) and Van Dooremalen-Van Cutsen from the Netherlands (ER 12 WR 40). Last but not least 44 teams come to fight for the title in the Mixed Doubles category. Wouter Claes and Nathalie Descamps (ER 22 WR 51) will fight for a place in the finals against amongst others Wouters-Van Dooremalen (ER12 WR 26), Fuchs-Marinello of Germany (ER 16 WR 33) and Briggs-Bankier of Scotland (ER 17 WR 42). It promises to be a great tournament. list of participants on www.belgian-international.be
Please keep us updated as we follow this tourney.. I assume this is a 1* event, looks like there will be some pretty good competitions..It should be interesting to see how the Russian players(esp. WD and XD) will do, esp. after their domination in the just concluded U.S. Open(the other WD pair i'm not familiar with)..if anyone by any chance can take some pics of this tourney, we'd appreciate it if you guys can share with us..thx-
Off course we'll take pics BTW, you can find the draw here http://www.toernooi.nl/sport/draws.aspx?id=10895
Thanks for the pics, Jan_BE... ..nice pictures and appreciate for sharing them with us... ah, those pictures must've been taken with your new Canon camera??.. BTW, sorry, are you Peter Beyen, the same person's name on the pictures??..
