What if Yang Yang or Zhao Jian Hua were to play against Sun Jun or Lin Dan? Or any other Badminton greatest with another Badminton greatest at their own different times?? What kind of outcome would you expect? It was very interesting that a world tour tourney between Pete Sampras and Federer was organized this year (2008). They were the two Tennis giants in their own times. Will there be one for Badminton?
If there's going to be one held, there's no contest. Obviously Lin Dan will have no problems beating Zhao Jianhua or Yang Yang now.
They played in different eras. LD's style and todays game is obviously much faster than that of the previous generations. If ZJH and YY existed in today's generation as younger players we could only guess.
I think the games developed , nowadays you can't afford wrong shots(obviously ws the same back then but still) due to the new scoring system. I would say LD would win but no-one can really know.
It may call the 21-point rally system the new scoring system. However it was part of my training under our coach who was a China National team coach. We called it ping-pong rules for badminton and according to him, the National team did play in practice using those rules. The players you mentioned may not be so unused to the new scoring as you may think. You can check the the thread below for other comments more or less related to this topic. http://www.badmintoncentral.com/forums/showpost.php?p=139691&postcount=1
LD would easily win; as Federer did against Sampras last time they played. Badminton requires lots of speed and freedom of movement; things that you start to loose as you got older. I just don't think any former pros could keep up with LD today. I could be wrong though. One of my coaches is quite old (must be at least 60) but he can easily beat all of the younger players at my club and the other coaches. Instead of using explosive power or quick movement around court, he just uses awesome placement and deception to force you in to difficult positions. I would imagine if you were incredibly fit (elite marathon runner fitness would probably required) or incredibly good at rescue shots, then you may be able to beat him but it would still be hard.
