According to http://www.badminton-information.com/facts-about-badminton.html, Badminton is the second most popular sport in the world . Is that true?
imagine all the billions of asians all over the world. now imagine 1/10 of them play badminton. Everyone plays in school too. Its usually a required sport.
Its just weird to think about because where I live hardly anyone I know would think of badminton as their favorite sport.
Depends how you define "popular". 1: watched 2: played by anyone 3: membership of national bodies If we are only talking about 2, how many people participate, then I thought table tennis was the most popular. http://www.olympic.org/uk/sports/programme/index_uk.asp?SportCode=TT "Table tennis has become the world's largest participation sport, with 40 million competitive players worldwide and countless millions playing recreationally." So badminton isn't 2nd to soccer. It may be 2nd to table tennis.
also need to define "sport". is walking a sport, it is in the olympics too. if so, then walking is definitely going to be the #1 sport in the world. football won't even come close. is badminton a sport? a lot of ppl only see it as an activity/game to be played during picnics...
what? you mean you guys actually play indoors? of course it's only a picnic activity, everyone knows that! though i guess looking around, it's difficult to say for certain what the number 2 sport would be by popularity. basketball, tennis, golf, table tennis, squash perhaps?
#2 racket sport i guess. can't be #2 sport watched or played (including picnic players or not) cos there is always soccer, basketball, tennis, golf, etc...
i think soccer is 1st basketball is 2nd baseball is 3rd, badminton... unfortunately nowhere in the international sporting world
im pretty sure soccer is first b/c all you need is a ball. Badminton you need a net two rackets and a bird. Soccer is probably the cheapest sport to play in the world, which is why it is the most played.
I've heard as far as sheer volume of people playing, popularity of sports goes like this: 1. Soccer 2. Field hockey 3. Badminton I've heard it on reputable sources, too, I just can't remember offhand. Remember that the highest concentration fo people in teh world is found in India and China... badminton territory!
sorry, i just can't see field hockey in the top 5 sports at all. Even in my cowtown with ice hockey as #1, from my observation, even badminton is more popular than field hockey.
True... but remember that canada has less than 0.5% of the world's population. Field hockey is IMMENSELY popular in asia/africa/europe.
I think the two sports considered to be practiced by most people is football and volleyball. Think about it and it is quite logic. You only need a "ball" and can play (several people at the same time) where ever without any other equipment. Cheep and easy all over the world. When Hakeem became big in NBL I saw some articles stating that basket was closing in (and now with the big chinese guy even more). But here you need a better ball and court (to bounce) and also to be more particular about the baskets. IMO that restricts basket from ever become no1, but maybe 3rd. Otherwise "field hockey" might not be that far away....beacuse it is a very ancient game in several local/regional forms all over the world. Top 5-10 is my guess. Badminton should probably also be high up on the list, top 5?!?
As for popularity internationally recognized by sponsors/media (and maybe public) there is no doubt football is No1 with tennis and golf probably 2nd and 3rd. Then add F1, sailing (Americas Cup etc), basket, "horse sports", WRC, heavy weight boxing etc. Badminton? There might be many fans in Asia but sadly enough internationally the media and money just isn't there. Probably a sport like biathlon (which I personally like very much) have more attention and money even though it should be severly limitid in comparison given you need very specific natural conditions and relies heavily on equipment (skiis, weapon, cloths etc).
Well, if you don't need a pitch marked out for football, or proper goalposts, then you don't need a court marked out for badminton, or a proper net. Do two guys passing an American football to each other for fun count as playing American Football? You only need a ball... Where do we draw the line?
Well it depends. Some people appear to be discussing the sport in terms of sheer quantity of people playing, others are discussing it in terms of worldwide media coverage. Like I said, I've heard (reliably) that badminton is no. 3 as far as quantity goes... after all, it is one of if not the most popular sport in the most densely populated regions in the world. Not to mention in highly developed countries where it is not considered 'popular', it is still played as a staple school sport in virtually every school and is familiar to everyone across the world. The majority of the world's population is not familiar with ice hockey, volleyball, etc. However, these regions also do not have a large influence on mainstream 'Western' media, and without media coverage/promotion there is no money available for athletes, so leagues are neither as large or as population as sports which are better promoted. So in terms of this, I'd say badminton is extremely far down on the list.
Like the others said, I believe it depends on how you define popular, or sports for that matter. If you went up to different people in various countries and asked if they played badminton before i'm sure that many would say yes. On the other hand though, if you asked if badminton was their favourite sport or top three for that matter, i'm sure that you would get different answers. Also if you look at stats on popularity such as http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Countries_by_population you can see that China is number one in population by quite a substantial amount. It depends on the popularity of sports in certian countries and how populated those countries are.
