Sundis’ Field report: BWF World Championships 2019

Here comes my full summary from the world championships. It became longer and more extensive than I had planned and took some time to write also. The text had to be divided in a couple of different posts to fit.

I start with commenting some selected matches from day 3 and onwards. I made separate posts for day 1 and 2 in the thread for day 1 to QF, so look those posts up if you want to read about the first two days.

Day 3 matches:

Kidambi Srikanth vs Misha Zilberman: KS was slow and sluggish, he lost G1 before eventually winning the match. Either I suspect he has some injury preventing him from going 100% or he is just happy to be a mediocre player nowadays (compared to his former standard).

Loh Kean Yew vs Thomas Rouxel: Very hard-fought opening game which TR wins. LKY comes back however to win G2 and G3. I felt LKY due to having a bit more effective footwork and better skill/ more deceptive strokes overall used less energy compared to TR which made TR run out of gas earlier and therefore losing.

Chen Long vs Lee Cheuk Yiu: LCY was not holding back, he attacked 100 % whenever he had the opportunity, G1 was close, however LCY was faulted at the net (I couldn’t see what happened) and eventually lost G1. In G2 he became too tired to attack as much and lost.

Minions vs KOR: I had really looked forward to watching the minions live and they started well by winning G1, but then lost G2&3. KOR defence was strong, minions had a hard time to score points, the hall conditions looked a bit slow which favours KOR I guess. The end was close and dramatic. MF threw his racket after losing and both minions looked sad all the way when walking out from court.

Endo/Wata vs Lamsfuss /Seidel: The crowd went crazy to support GER, I didn’t watch the whole match because I had to go and eat but the first 1,5 games it looked like JPN had a hard time to score points, the GER defence was strong and they could often turn the defence around to win the rallies. A big upset.

 

Day 4 matches (R16):

Kam/Son vs He/Tan: JPN lost G1 and had to work very hard to take the next 2 games, they were often on the attack expending a lot of energy by smashing at the CHN pair. It worked in the end and they won but I can’t help to think that they were tired afterwards.

Kantaphon vs Srikanth: SK was thrashed by KW:s attacking game, it looked like he had no answers. A disappointing performance by SK.

Mia B vs Saina: In G2 there was some strange calls from the umpire and both the players and coaches were unhappy. I wasn’t so close to court 3 so I couldn’t see the details though.

Ratcha vs Grego: amazing comeback by Intanon to save matchpoints in G2 and force the deciding game in which she could win with ease.

LZJ vs Nishimoto: Close in G3 with LZJ pulling off an amazing defensive shot which can be watched in higlights at BWF youtube for anyone interested. Very good achievement for LJZ to reach the QFs.

CTC vs LKY: LKY delivered a very stiff fight and made CTC work hard for his win, a good and entertaining match.

Antonsen VS Tsuneyama: AA races to a big lead in G1, I think 14-2 he was up. However, KT finds his game and almost takes G1 at 21-20 but decided to serve long and he served too long by about 2-3 cm I guess from watching the Hawk-eye review and in the end Antonssen takes G1 and G2 but it wasn’t an easy win.

Choi/Seo vs Lee/Wang: Probably one of the most entertaining matches with good rallies and dives. At 19-19 in G1 Lee Yang dived 3 times and TPE won the rally eventually. This however was not included in the BWF youtube compilation of the top saves of the week which is ridiculous.

Momota vs HSP: HSP was the only player in the tournament who could challenge Momota in one full game, but when he lost G1 21-19 the challenge was over.

Sai vs Ginting: An even G1 but after losing G1 Ginting looked clueless and could not find his way back into the match, credit to Sai for playing so well.

Jojo vs Jorgensen: Jojo has a more powerful game than Tommy Sugiatro who meekly succumbed to Jorgensen earlier in the tournament. Jojo mostly applied the right gameplan but there were some patches when Jojo looked nervous or made many unforced errors, however Jorgensen couldn’t capitalise on his G2 interval lead and Jojo came back to win G2.

FajRi vs Goh/Tan: This match was quite late, and many spectators had already left. It felt as if Goh/Tan definitely had the skills to win but I guess the way they lost G2 & G3 shows they are too unfit since going independent. What I also noticed was how much less elevation GVS has on his jump-smash compared to when I last saw him live in 2016. The most fun and peculiar thing however was that former Danish player Joachim Fischer came and sat in the row in front of me and vocally cheered for Goh/Tan during the match.

Liao/Su vs Astrup/Skurup: Another upset as the higher ranked Danes lost. I almost expected this though as A/S mainly rely on hard work to win matches and have no real special skills that can win them rallies and this day Liao/Su played well and fought hard.

Tabeling/Piek vs Jordan/Okta: I cannot believe how inconsistent this INA pair is, I hardly watched the match but still felt the need to comment on their performance.

CL vs NGKL: CL needed close to 1,5 hours and 3 games to defeat an opponent who could hardly score any points against him. This match shows the decline of CL even though he won in the end, it was not a convincing performance at all and cost a lot of energy. CL´s attacking game seem to not exist anymore.

 

Day 5 matches (QF)

NO vs HBJ: A bit surprised how easy it was for NO to win, especially in G1.

Sai vs Jojo: a very close G1 that Sai won and in G2 Sai took a big lead, then Jojo started serving high and Sai smashed out his returns which almost got JC back in the game but in the end, Sai was composed enough to pull through with not so many errors.

Chen YF vs Mia B: A very tense match with a lot of crowd support for Mia. CYF has very good foot work and defensive skills which in the end made Mia run out of patience and make errors even though she was leading in G3, I feel the DEN coaches could have done better to calm Mia down or use a better strategy in late G3, then maybe she could have pulled it off.

Kantaphon vs Chou: Another QF loss for poor Chou, no WC medal yet. KW started strong with heavy attacking in G1 to take the lead and win G1. CTC came back with some more attacking game himself to take G2 convincingly. In G3 however KW went on attacking mode again and CTC began looking tired and couldn’t keep up very well. Big success for KW to get a WC medal so early in his career.

Wata/Higa vs Chan/Goh: The outcome is a bit similar to Goh /Tan´s loss. Plays well to take G1 but then cannot keep up at all in the next 2 games.

Momota vs LZJ: Momota was just too strong, destroyed his opponent. If LZJ had a different draw though he may have got into SF I believe.

PVS vs TTY: A fantastic match, very high quality, should have been the final. PVS shows amazing fighting spirit to defeat the very skilled TTY.

Du/Li vs Taka/Matsu: This is the WD that took forever, 126 minutes of agony. Multiple brakes when the doctor came in, first to spray Matsu`s leg and later because of CHN player cramping. The amount of time wasted by all brakes was ridiculous. Cramp is not an injury, it´s an issue related to poor fitness and a player should not be allowed unlimited time for sitting on the floor to stretch between rallies. The umpire should have enforced continuous play and given CHN yellow and/or red card if they couldn’t continue quicker.

Hoki/Kobayashi vs Kam/Son: The breakthrough match for H/K beating their seniors and earning a medal. Kam/Son looked a bit tired from their previous matches I believe though.

Li/Liu vs Liu/Zhang: 21-13 21-12 in 28 minutes. Many weird mistakes and unforced errors from Liu/Zhang. My impression/opinion is that Liu/Zhang threw the match so Li/Liu can be well rested for SF.

Antonsen vs CL: A good start from CL where he tried to play some long rallies but AA got the hang of it and found a way to score many points with sliced dropshots to the front corners. CL held 2 gps but lost G1. In G2 Antonsen commanded everything and CL could not mount any comeback. It was embarrassing for the Olympic champion and twice former world champion to lose G2 21-10. Well done by AA though to get a medal which he stated before the tournament was his goal.

 

Day 6 matches (SF)

PVS vs CYF: Total destruction, CYF looked spent and PVS was impressive.

Momota vs Sai: Sai needs to be much more fit before he can challenge Momota, I feel if he is ever going to beat Momota he needs to have an equal fitness, so he has enough confidence to try and outmanouver Momota in consecutive long rallies. Today Sai wass evidently not good enough.

Noz vs Ratcha: Clearly Ratcha is less fit and therefore cannot win, she has the skills, but the fitness is lacking compared to other top WS players.

Zheng/Huang vs Yuta/Higa: Impressive match by CHN pair, getting the attack most of the time and ZSW firing smashes. Yuta/Higa never were close. Maybe JPN should try to let Yuta play XD with a different partner just for experiment purpose?

Antonsen vs Kantaphon: AA´s defense held up well, KW also looked like he had accumulated some fatigue from his hard match vs Chou last night. Surprisingly easy win for AA.

Daddies vs FajRi: As expected Daddies won, at times they were supreme.

Dechapol/Sapsiree vs Wang/Huang: An amazing performance by THA XD, a very good match with THA coming out on top in many amazing rallies.

Hoki/Koba vs Li/Liu: biggest upset of the day when mighty twin towers lost to unfancied JPN pair. G1 was a hard fight but in G2 when JPN took the lead CHN collapsed and there were many uncharacteristic errors from CHN pair, probably because of nerves and the pressure of expectations.

 

Day 7 matches (Finals)

Matsu/Naga vs Fuku/Hiro: It was easier for the taller pair to score points, Matsumoto has a very hard smash for a female player. In G3 Fuku/Hiro saved many match points and held one match point of their own before finally losing 23-21. Cruel for Fuku/Hiro to get 3 consecutive Silvers.

PVS vs NO: A very one-sided match, I don’t have so much to say about the match, but I’m happy PVS finally got a WC gold medal.

Momota vs Antonsen: AA had a good start leading 6-2 and at that time I was a little worried about how Momota would fare. I didn’t have to worry very long though as Momota took the interval lead. From then the match became very one sided. Momota executed the perfect gameplan vs Antonsen and had obviously learned from his previous chocking defeat to him in the INA masters final. I think Antonsens game plan was lacking. My impression of the Antonsen game plan is as follows:

Plan A: I’m the best player in the world and I’m going to win! (which also his entry to the court indicated)

Plan B: Sh*t I don’t know what to do, I’m losing!

Plan C: I will try to catch up by taking chances and going for winners too early and from out of position.

The official Antonsen excuse as I´ve heard is that he was tired which can very well explain a loss, however I don’t get why he would be that tired after a R1 WO and then 4 straight game victories. (The match vs Tsuneyama was harder than most 2 game matches though). I think the match looked more like a mental collapse loss ala Viktor Axelsen to Momota who was too good with the right game plan. Anyway, a silver medal is a great achievement and there is no need to make excuses.

XD final: CHN performed very well and won surprisingly easy. I had expected a closer match given the sensational performance from THA XD in SF. But a silver medal is still a very good achievement.

Daddies vs Hoki/Koba: A close and exciting G1 with daddies prevailing 25-23. In G2 JPN played much better and easily won 21-9! The umpire called INA and told them to give their best effort when they gave up in the end of G2. A bit ridiculous in some way that the umpire did so according to me, does he expect INA to spend a lot of energy and fight hard trying to come back from 9-19 down in G2 which is just going to make them more tired in G3? Anyway, daddies got going in G3 and won the match. I feel that G1 was crucial and probably decided the match. I hope Hoki/Koba can continue to produce good results in the upcoming tournaments.

 

My thoughts and opinions about Basel and what I did other than watching badminton:

The city was mostly nice and tidy, and the weather was mainly good and not too cold. Public transportation either by bus or tram is recommended. There is something called a Basel-card which was included in my hotel booking (surprisingly) which gave me free access to all public transport and 50% off entries to all museums and the zoo. What I disliked about their public transport was just how many people that were smoking when waiting for the bus or tram, cough cough.

Traveling to and from Basel is not that easy (and depends on from where you start your journey of course), the airport is quite small and does only seem to have flights going to other European countries. For those coming from far away that means that you must take at least one extra flight compared to if going to any bigger more established European city.

Basel is located close to both Germany and France and it would have been quite easy to visit those countries also when already in Basel but I didn´t do that though.

The biggest issue with Basel (and Switzerland in general?) is that everything is expensive. Eating at a restaurant is expensive, even supposedly cheap fast food restaurants such as Subway or Mc Donalds are expensive. Breakfast at my hotel was 27 (!!) CHF per person/day, luckily, I had booked my room so the breakfast was included at a much cheaper price somehow.

Other than going to the WC I was at the Basel zoo which was very nice and fun and good value for money. There were elephants, giraffes, penguins, monkeys and many more cool animals. I recommend everyone who go to Basel to visit the zoo. I was also at the museum of natural history which was decent, and I visited the Toy worlds museum which I also can recommend.

 

What I think about St Jakobshalle and the organization of the event:

The arena has a quite steep inclination of the spectator’s area which is good in the way that short people can be seated behind someone tall and still have a good view. The disadvantage is that if you lose your balance and fall somewhere in the spectator area you can get hurt badly. The normal spectator areas are therefore not very handicap-friendly, people who cannot climb stairs on their own cannot be seated in the regular spectator area. I guess they had some designated space for people with wheelchairs to be seated.

The leg room was decent, not good and not too bad. The seats were made from hard wood so for those going there in the future you should bring something to sit on for the comfort of your b*tt.

One thing that I also should mention is that I sat on the 3rd row from the court and I wasn’t that close to the court, I could still see quite good but compared to my previous tournament experiences this was the most far away from the court. In All England you sit a bit closer to the court if I recall correctly. For comparison the closest to court experience I have had was at the Vietnam open super 100, if you sit at the first row there, you can reach out with your arm and touch the line judge if you want.

The noise level in the arena was mostly bearable, I didn´t regret that I forgot to bring earplugs. Only when the home players played, or the crowd cheered hard for some occasional European player did I feel the need to hold my ears.

Outside the main hall (still inside the building) there were some different stands and souvenir shops. Also, there was one restaurant, and a few other shops that sold snacks and drinks. Yonex had a small boutique where you could buy shoes, apparel and rackets (mainly 4u), Victor and Li-Ning had similar establishments. I didn´t buy anything as the prices were not very wallet-friendly. Each major brand had their own stringing service it seemed, however Victor and li-Ning had only one stringing machine each (at least from what I could see) while Yonex had an extensive organisation with many people and at least three machines.

I ate at least one meal per day in the restaurant, but the food was mostly too salty for my taste. The biggest inconvenience when it came to food and how to survive the many long days of watching badminton was the security who didn´t allow for any fan to bring bottles or anything eatable or drinkable inside the hall. What was available to purchase other than too salty meals were different less healthy snacks and sandwiches which were made from reasonable ingredients and tasted good but were expensive. The most inconvenient thing was that even if you bought your drinks from the official source in the arena you only got a 40 cl cup containing your drink, it wasn’t even possible to buy a bottle. A cup with fluid you have to hold in your hand or put on the floor in front of or under your seat when you are watching badminton. A bottle is much more convenient to have in the arena as you can close the cap and don’t have to worry all the time about spilling out your precious drink. As the cheapest price for any drink was 5 CHF I also had to sneak in to the lavatory to fill my cup with water from there (I wasn’t the only one who did this).

One fun thing about eating in the arena restaurant was that usually you could see some players or coaches eating there also, among others I saw Lee Zii Jia, Lee Cheuk Yiu, H S Prannoy, Zhang Ning together with some other CHN coaches and many more less fancied players. I didn’t see any currently active superstar player eating there though.

The arena was set up so that from Monday to Thursday 4 courts were in use, for Friday 2 courts and for Saturday and Sunday only 1 court. In my opinion it is preferable to start with 5 courts in use in a WC to make the schedule a bit more compact and reduce the risk of some players having to play very late in the evening. Only ct 1 and 2 had an instant review system. Many players playing on Ct 3 and 4 complained in vain about line calls.

One problem with having 10 SFs on 1 court is that there will be a difference in resting time for the finals between the two finalists with one having had many hours more of rest. My suggestion would be to use 5 courts for day 1-3, 4 courts for day 4, 3 courts for day 5, 2 courts for day 6 and 1 court for day 7. And with Hawkeye on every court preferably. I guess the organizer want fans to stay as long and possible in the arena and spend more money there, which can be one reason why the schedule is so stretched out with not many courts in use. Many matches on day 1-3 were one sided and not very competitive, so having one court more increases the chances that at least one match all the time is good to watch for the fans in the arena.

This was the first time ever that the Para badminton WC was held at the same time and place with the regular WC. There were two more halls in addition to the main hall which you could access from the same concourse after you had gone past the security and ticket control at the main entrance. One hall was for wheelchair badminton, it had 4 courts, and the other hall was for people with short stature or some lower or upper limb disability. I think that hall had 5 courts but I’m not sure if I recall correctly.

Having both WCs together meant that there were a lot of people and much more crowded than what it would be if only the regular WC was held. I feel that the facilities were too small to host everything, there could be long lines to the lavatory or the restaurant in which you had to stand and wait thinking about how many good rallies of badminton that took place inside the arena in your absence.

One more annoying thing was the amount of people who had VIP-passes (or just normal players/coach/name-tag necklace) I think you get what I mean. Every one of those seemed to have access to the main hall and came to take seat in the area next to me (or take my seat when I went to the toilet or wherever!) and then when the ticket holder (or me) for that seat came back many people had to move around, and the view was blocked by people moving around and everything was a mess. I wish they had a designated area somewhere where only the “pass people” could sit so us normal paying fans didn´t have to suffer from such inconvenience as described above.

I watched a little of the para badminton (both wheelchair and the other categories) and was actually surprised how good many of the players were. The matches were also quite competitive. So if you suffer from an accident and have to spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair, at least it is still possible to enjoy playing badminton in some form.

Another thing worth mentioning is that after each match had finished the players were escorted out and away from the court by the court officials quickly and effectively without any chance for the fans to get an autograph, a selfie or anything like that. In the whole week the only exception was when Ahsan &/or Setiawan signed some guys flag after one of their early matches. Maybe some lucky fan got an autograph from some of the champions during the lap of honour also but that was it. They had some scheduled autograph sessions with some players in the Yonex and Li-Ning stands at the 2 last days of competition, Akane Yamguchi, Chen Yufei, Chen Qingchen/Jia Yifan and Sai Praneeth are the players I can remember doing autograph sessions like that. Also, during the whole tournament there were 0 !!! players throwing anything into the crowd. I was almost expecting Antonsen to go nuts and throw a racket or at least something into the crowd after reaching the final but nope, nothing. One more policy forbidding the players to do so among all the other strict policies in the St Jakobshalle? I don’t know.

 

Do I want to come back to Basel/St Jakobshalle in the future for watching badminton?

If they host another big event like the WC in the future, I will consider it, however going there for the regular Swiss open tournament is something I would probably never do, why? Because I can go to the All England which has a much better line up of players and the total cost will be significantly cheaper (I don’t live in England). All England still is a better organized event I feel with a better atmosphere. And you can sit a bit closer to court and players can usually give you an autograph after the match.

Here is a photo of me and the Daddies after they won the Final. I edited out myself for privacy reasons.

 

Some other things that happened worth mentioning:

After the finals were concluded on sunday me and my co-traveller(s) went out for dinner, we decided to go to a Thai restaurant. When we arrived outside the restaurant, I saw two guys I recognized standing outside the entrance smoking. They were from the Li-Ning stringing team. So, we went inside the restaurant and got seated next to the entrance/exit at the front. We ordered food and I asked the waitress to have ice for my soda, but she said the ice had run out because they had a big reservation from the china badminton team which were there eating more far inside the restaurant. I was of course curious after hearing that and pretended to go looking for the toilet hoping I could catch a glimpse of the CHN badminton team. The most far inside the restaurant there was a section that was a bit more secluded from the rest where they were sitting, I saw Zhang Jun through the open door leading there and the back of some others which I couldn’t see who they were. I decided against pretending to be stupid and walk in there asking where the toilet was, so I went back to my table and ate. While eating I observed some of the CHN coaching staff with Xia Xuanze being the only one I can mention by name going out of the restaurant to stand outside and smoke. A few minutes later Wang Yi Lyu also walked out and stood outside the restaurant apparently chatting with some of the others outside. I could see them through the window from my table. About 10 minutes later who I believe was the CHN team translator came to the desk to pay the bill, I overheard them and it was a bill for today’s meal and the last time that CHN team ate there also, In total more than 2000 CHF (!!). A few minutes later they began to leave, and I could see everyone of them as the walked past my table on the way out. Those I could recognize were: Li Jun Hui, Huang Dong Ping, Du Yue, Li Yin Hui, Zhang Jun, Huang Yuxiang (?), the Li-Ning stringing team guys (who apparently are connected to or directly working for the CHN national team) and some more coaches and staff. However, to my disappointment there was no Lin Dan or Chen Long, if so, I would probably have intercepted them and asked for a photo. In total I estimate them to have been between 15-20 people.


On the day after the finals my journey back home began, the first leg was a flight departing from Basel airport. After arriving to the gate at the airport I saw P V Sindhu, she was dressed in normal clothes and stood up/walked around a little while talking on the phone in English. It sounded like she was giving an interview over the phone because she said that she was happy about winning and so on. Sitting next to the gate were also Kim Ji Hyun together with some older male IND important people connected to PVS, I recognized their faces but can not name them. Anyway, I waited until PVS had finished the phone call and asked for a selfie which she accepted. A bit later Gopichand and the male Korean coach who also works for India joined the others.




How much money did it cost to go for the WC in Switzerland?

In total if including the traveling cost, hotel, tickets, how much more money spent on food compared to if staying at home, the average price/person was about 2000 Euro or 2200 Usd.


If anyone have any questions about anything you can ask me.

 

Thank you! Writing my posts made me re-live the whole trip/tournament again.

 

It is a secret sorry