who's to blame for the match throwing?

Discussion in 'Olympics LONDON 2012' started by kwun, Aug 1, 2012.

?

who's to be blamed for the match throwing?

  1. The players are at fault for throw matches

    2 vote(s)
    28.6%
  2. BWF is to blame for implementing group structure

    1 vote(s)
    14.3%
  3. no one / other are to be blamed.

    0 vote(s)
    0.0%
  4. both players and BWF are to be blamed

    4 vote(s)
    57.1%
  1. LD rules!

    LD rules! Regular Member

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  2. cobalt

    cobalt Moderator

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    Well, it's their fault really. They thought they could operate the show like some British curry-and-cucumber-sandwiches club straight from out of the Raj, all chummy and close and incestuous. Then one fine day they woke up to find the wolf at the door. Only problem was, they had removed the door themselves a long time ago! :p

    They could have taken the cue from any number of international sports associations and councils who put stringent checks and balances, and reporting/punitive structures in place. But they didn't. Now the entire badminton fraternity is reaping the bitter harvest of their foolishness.
     
  3. kinetics

    kinetics Regular Member

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    It's funny. I was just watching Michael Phelps in the 100M Butterfly (semi-finals I believe) which he ended up winning. And the commentator said something along the lines of.. "I can't believe he actually tried his best. I would've figured he'd save his effort for the final race." Not direct quotes but something like that. So it goes to show that it's pretty normal for athletes to not try their best in every single race. Their long-term goal is gold. A win in one match or a race means nothing.

    And here, the IOC is outright stating every athlete needs to try their best in EVERY single match/race. It's clear that this often does not happen.

    What's sad is that the organizers of the badminton event were TOLD by coaches from many different teams that round robin was a terrible idea and that there would be purposeful losing in order to manipulate draws. The organizers dismissed it and said that they had everything under control. Now it looks like they were wrong and they have to punish the players in order to shift the blame from themselves.
     
  4. craigandy

    craigandy Regular Member

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    Hahaha brilliant line!
     
  5. squashnut

    squashnut New Member

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    I would just like to say that in the few squash events that play out dead rubbers, the match is usually played 2/3 instead of 3/5. I have never seen anyone play hard in a meaningless match, if any matches are still to be played, and top players have lost "matches" to players they would beat 100 times out of 100.

    This is about sports betting in London (big business) and ticket sales.
     
  6. dustin

    dustin New Member

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    I think it's awful what's happening to the players.

    This is completely the IOC/BWF's fault, and not the players' fault at all.

    Imagine if they set up the finals of Men's Singles such that the LOSER would win the GOLD medal, and then Lin Dan and LCW both served everything into the net to try to get the gold. Then IOC/BWF act like the players are huge cheats, kick them both out of the tournament, strip their olympic credentials, make them issue public apologies and also investigate their coaches.

    The organizers should never have put the round robin system into place, and then later on when they were notified in time by everyone about what was going to happen, they should have announced new seeding rules for the knockout stage. If anyone should resign over this, it should be someone from IOC/BWF, not one of the players.
     
  7. gamelessx25

    gamelessx25 Regular Member

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    What are you trying to say? Why in the world would they get banned if the tournament said the gold medal goes to the person that loses? They're playing by the rules here by missing shots if that's the case :p. In your scenario, the person who is "cheating" would be the person playing to win lol.

    Come again?
     
  8. cobalt

    cobalt Moderator

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    I'd just like to point out (as has been done a few times already :) ) that the matches played in the WD were not meaningless. They were, to the contrary, extremely meaningful. China was trying to ensure a one-two whammy for the finals, and Korea and the rest were trying to ensure the opposite. They could do that only by not playing to the best of their abilities; i.e., tanking the match. I have no illusions this is just match-fixing in another name.

    The teams and coaches should consider themselves very fortunate this is not a big-ticket game (yet) like football or cricket where hundreds of millions (probably more) of Dollars are wagered on any match or outcome. But then again, who knows how much was wagered privately by people on the inside, in these matches? I am not making any accusations but I am laying out the possibilities in such a scenario. In the event, the BWF made the correct call - eventually.

    If you read up on the BWF "initiative" on whistle-blowing to control illegal betting, match-fixing etc, it makes me cringe. They have a stupid clause in there that would actually discourage most people from opening their mouths! Compare this to say, the ICC as below:

    "The ICC follows a policy of zero-tolerance towards corruption in Cricket. It is committed to keep the game clean at any cost.
    "The ICC welcomes any information relating to corruption in cricket including information on match fixing, gambling in cricket by participating cricket players/match officials, or any other information relating to attempts by potential corruptors to compromise the players or match officials in any manner. Such information can be passed on to the Anti-Corruption & Security Department (ACSU) of the ICC either through email : contactACSU@icc-cricket.com or on the ACSU hotline telephone number : +971 4 3417225.
    "The identity of the person sharing information will be kept strictly confidential and will not be revealed to anyone outside of ACSU without specific permission of the informer/whistle blower."

    Such a simple phrase: "zero-tolerance towards corruption" that sends a clear signal of intent, but completely missing from the BWF vocabulary.
     
  9. visor

    visor Regular Member

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    http://www.cbc.ca/olympics/badminton/story/2012/08/01/spf-rice-badminton-scandal.html

    commentary and insight from an ex olympian baddy player, anna rice

    I’m not going to lie, I’m happy this whole scandal went down.
    Not only has it given our women’s doubles team of Alex Bruce and Michele Li a second chance at Canada’s first Olympic medal in the sport of badminton, it has also guaranteed (finally!) some significant media coverage of our sport here at home.
    This fiasco has also shed some — OK, a lot of — light on the issue of match fixing, a nasty affliction that affects several Olympic sports (just ask Henry Kissinger and the rest of the FIFA anti-corruption squad to name an example), and an issue which has afflicted our sport for over 30 years.
    This scandal has rocketed badminton into the mainstream media spotlight the world over, with commentators arguing over who is most to blame.
    Was it the new BWF (Badminton World Federation) system, which encouraged teams to tactically lose round-robin matches to secure a more favourable draw in the elimination rounds?
    Was it the coaches, who undoubtedly asked the athletes to lose and avoid the tougher opponents in the knockout rounds?
    Was it the athletes, who, at the Olympics, should be compelled to give their utmost effort under the watchful eye of the global media?
    I say it was a combination of all of the above. But that’s not my point. What the mainstream media has missed is the opportunity to applaud the Badminton World Federation for an extremely courageous gesture in the face of a few of its most powerful stakeholders.
    The BWF, whose political and financial strongholds are traditionally located in China, Indonesia and Korea, disqualified athletes from each of these countries, and inside sources claim that the decision was taken despite threats from China that it would pull its entire team from the Olympic badminton competition in protest.
    Furthermore, the decision to disqualify the Chinese women’s doubles team will likely cause serious financial blowback in the coming two years, which the BWF understood full well before pulling the DQ trigger.
    What’s more, the president of our world body, Mr. Kang Young Joong of Korea — himself a former president of the Korean Badminton Federation — would have had to approve this decision to disqualify these four teams.
    All of the disqualified are medal contenders, and two of them hail from his home country. Mr. Kang’s personal profile could take a big hit in his home country as a result of this decision.
    Critics will argue that this newly implemented pool play system was flawed, and surely it was. The pool play should have consisted of a blind crossover, which would remove the incentive to throw the matches. The BWF will almost certainly alter, if not eliminate, this system all together in time for the Rio Olympics in four years.
    However, our sport’s world leaders have done the right thing by upholding the rules of the BWF’s Player Code of Conduct and by taking a firm moral stance in favour of the Olympic ideals.
    It's easy for us to argue over who made this mess and indeed there are many culprits.
    But I would like to acknowledge and appreciate that this time, with the world watching, someone had the courage to clean it up instead of passing the buck.
    Anna Rice is a two-time Olympian in badminton and the head coach at Badminton-Vancouver (www.badminton-vancouver.com).
     
  10. eaglehelang

    eaglehelang Regular Member

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    The crux would be did the players benefit from a more a favourable draw in the next round if they lost that dead rubber.
    If they didnt, then it's as you say, a meaningless match.
     
  11. pcll99

    pcll99 Regular Member

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    they should have done another draw after the round robin stage.
     
  12. SibugiChai

    SibugiChai Regular Member

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    All the baddie players I spoke to agree to this punish,ent but still find people pity these banned players in bc, keyboard warriors?..
     
  13. pjswift

    pjswift Regular Member

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    Who s to blame? CHN, of course. For the WR1 to have the gall to play like kindergarteners on the prestigious global stage of the Olympics and believe they can get away with it, betrays LYB s clout over BWF. Note that in MD, CaiFu fought to make sure they face their teammates, ChaiGuo, because they are not 100% sure they can take out BoMo . However, CHN is confident their WDs can get gold and silver so they want to be greedy by making sure they play in different halves. That s not surprising. What surprises is the blatant, nonchalant manner they showed it. CHN wants to cheat so badly that they want to lose in record time, to save energy! ( just get it over and done with, don t worry about the fans, this is not Singapore, this is London, very civilised people, one can imagine the coach s instructions...) To the level where even if you don t know badminton, you will know something is wrong or stupid with this sport and anyone who is a fan must be stupid enough to be one. What CHN WD is telling the crowd is we can do as we like because we know you are so stupid, you will put up with it ( only 20 min, ok, just bear with it) and not complain about it. Luckily, we have a smart Aussie coach who refuses to be belittled who have the good sense to lodge a complaint so IOC comes to know about it and BWF has to do something they have never dared do to CHN, in spite of all their cheating over many years, through walkovers and fake matches. You know who should be fired to save the sport of Badminton. PR of BWF for letting CHN cheat so often for so long. Now BWF has proven they can do something if they want to. And LYB disgraces China big time to the whole world. ( let s have a country quiz. Use one word adjective to describe Singapore. Efficient. China? Cheating?) And the media is going to dig out more truths about CHN badminton because they are so starved for sensational stories.
     
  14. SibugiChai

    SibugiChai Regular Member

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    well said, they are lucky they are plying in London where the bad,inton crowd are known to be gentle, if they do this in some less develop nation, I am people will start throwing stuffs into the court...
     
  15. AlanY

    AlanY Regular Member

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    who is going to have a go first?
     
  16. xymaerts

    xymaerts Regular Member

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    Foot ball like world cup & Euro cup also implemented group match.. But, why can't we see they abuse it?
     
  17. visor

    visor Regular Member

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    you don't see it, but they can use their weaker or rookie players when they are not serious about winning (if you read between the lines, that just means they don't use their stronger star players if they can afford to lose) ;)

    happens all the time in team sports, it's just that it's not as obvious ;)

    and this would be considered smart tactics on the part of the coaches ;)
     
  18. habsq

    habsq Regular Member

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    1. The scheduling makes it more difficult to abuse the rules.
    2. They actually abuse it, but they make it less obvious.
     
  19. SibugiChai

    SibugiChai Regular Member

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    I belib FIFA will do as BWF is team start scoring own GOALS from kick off
     
  20. habsq

    habsq Regular Member

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    This has happened before in an international football match. Two teams trying hard not to win, eventually one of them decided to make a back pass all the way to the defender and score to his own goal.

    The guy was suspended from international football for life, others left unscathed. No disqualification, no punishments for the two nations involved.
     

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