Badminton in Japan

Discussion in 'Japan Professional Players' started by gaDEfan, May 6, 2007.

  1. Cheung

    Cheung Moderator

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    As explained before, he can’t because the players are paid employees of other companies.

    So just like football, these companies hold the sway in whether a player can go to national training.

    The system was actually working quite well before Covid as you can see in normal circumstances Japan doing well internationally. PJB already made a massive improvement.

    Just because Covid comes along doesn’t mean to say the whole system needs to be overhauled. Examined yes, but don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.
     
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  2. baddiechan

    baddiechan Regular Member

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    I agree with your assessment of PJB, there is only so much he can do in the Japanese system the players are stuck in. Overall aside from Kento Momota and the Fukushima/Hirota one the others are still real losses. From my perspective, going into the Olympic Games everyone had to throw out the past history.

    Momota - He was lucky to even play in the Olympic Games, if they weren't delayed he wouldn't have shown up. His longevity is more important than progressing to say first or second round here.

    I guess the other thing is that for Nozomi, WataGashi and Matsumoto/Nagahara they were all 3 game matches. They all had the ability to win if you only look at skill but nerves and mentality decided it ultimately.

    As for Watanabe/Endo - yea that was some terrible scheduling by the Olympics, however in my mind they were the favourites to win gold. Just couldn't play to usual standard and outdone by Wang/Lee aggression.
     
  3. extremenanopowe

    extremenanopowe Regular Member

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    Worst performance at home. Embarassing. Pjb and other coaching staffs resigning soon I bet. ;)
     
  4. nokh88

    nokh88 Regular Member

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    Coach from Taiping can apply for the various positions.
     
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  5. kurako

    kurako Regular Member

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    @Cunning Linguist

    Yamaguchi was so close in G2. Had it gone to the rubber, she may well have taken the match, based on stamina, if nothing else. With Pusarla in such great form, her never-die attitude really left a strong impression.

    What is your take on this particular match?
     
  6. yuon

    yuon Regular Member

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    After seeing her cried after losing in the QF in Rio, I really wanted Yamaguchi to get past the QF this year, but she was really unlucky with the draw. Of all 4 possible opponents, she had to get the one with whom she had the worst h2h against. So many errors and it was really uncharacteristic of her to not be able to adjust the hitting length like that, and that was a good catch up from her in game 2, but she failed to close the game, yet again. It has happened way too often.

    I was really hoping to see the form she had when she won the IO and JO in 2019, but that was, unfortunately, still far from it. Really hope she can get it back once regular tournaments start again.
     
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  7. LenaicM

    LenaicM Regular Member

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    A few days before the tournament ends, we can already review the performances of the national team as every single Japanese player is already out, and there isn't much to say. Results speak for themselves and that corresponds to a single, yet honorable, bronze medal.

    Fan of the team or not, that is one disappointing collective result and I dare to say, a failure. I do hope someone (PJB?) would give an honest explanation based on true feelings and thoughts rather than a formal empty apology. I personally do not mind the failure in itself but I would really appreciate an explanation to understand what happened and see than the failure has been acknowledged and an effort will be provided to correct it for future major events. To get one single bronze medal with such a team cannot be blamed on bad luck/schedule/draw alone.
     
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  8. Swaraj Lakshman

    Swaraj Lakshman Regular Member

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    In 2020 , while watching the Japanese players play, I was so confident that no matter how players in other disciplines fare but the forte set by Japan in WD shall surely ascertain another consecutive Gold or a Silver and in worst case scenario ,Bronze in the Olympics.

    For that matter , even the third Japanese team of Chiharu Shida and Matsuyama could give no.1 WD teams of other countries a decent challenge, such was the level of WD. Not taking about Matsutomo and Takahashi as they are not playing anymore.

    Except for a few chinks in the armour here or there. Like Fukushima and Hirota having answers to all teams except Matsumoto and Nagahara ,while the latter struggling against the Koreans mostly.

    WD Team of Japan was the Team every other Team looked on to as favourites in any competitions they participated.

    Not taking into account any other discipline, I felt so disheartened to see none of the two WD team even reach the Semi Finals. One team may not be 100% fit but the other seemed 100% fit.

    Hope Japan looks into this issue of Flick serves and not to succumb under pressure.

    XD,they lost many points against Huang's flick serve.

    MD , Endo struggling to execute them correctly and/or choosing a very wrong time to do one.

    WD, like MD ,wonder why Matsumoto chose Flick serve towards the decider points.

    Lastly ,KUDOS and all cedits to Japan for conducting Olympics,a mammoth of an event so magnificently amidst the pandemic , hoping to see every player come back much stronger and make Japan proud.

    Sent from my SM-N975F using Tapatalk
     
    #2248 Swaraj Lakshman, Jul 30, 2021
    Last edited: Jul 30, 2021
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  9. samkool

    samkool Regular Member

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    on the whole i don't think japan is broken, given the bwf 'team' bylaws.

    the olympics.
    founded in greece, by greeks.
    tragedy will be rampant.
     
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  10. Cunning Linguist

    Cunning Linguist Regular Member

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    Part 1
    I haven't seen it yet. I couldn't get any stream to work here, so I was just following the score while watching Djokovic - Zverev on TV. When she was 20-18 up in game 2, I was convinced she'd **** it up, and, sure enough, she did.

    Part 2:
    I've seen it now and was actually disappointed by how bad the entire performance was. The forum comments sounded like I had missed a great game. AY looked off pace throughout. My initial thought that she did not look particularly physically fit, manifested on court. Much slower than she used to be, imo. She turned 24 a month ago - she isn't an "old hag", she was just badly prepared for the most important tournament.

    Upon count (I didn't find a complete version of the game online, 3 points are always missing) AY made 18 unforced errors, Sindhu's best source of points. She also produced many bad clears/lifts (from 20-18 to 20-21 in the second, for example) or pushed shots into Sindhu's hitting zone.

    What I really can't hear anymore and what I think is also totally detrimental to the development of Japanese players is this "you did your best" or "you fought hard" stuff. Everybody is doing their effing best at the Olympics. It's absolute nothing special to "do your best", it's the barest minimum.
    What is special, is being unable to cope with pressure situations to such an extent that it has become a trademark for the women's side of Bird Japan (most of the male players are not good enough to even arrive at those situations in the first place, so they are worse than the ladies). It's coporate identity. We all knew Nagamatsu would lose against the Koreans. We knew it. And as if they wanted to prove a point, they had 5 or 6 match points and played catastrophic badminton for every single one. They didn't "do their best". They failed, predictably.

    @Cheung suggested it is probably a cultural thing, and he might be right. I can't judge that and I'm sorry for sounding patronizing towards professional athelets and coaches, but with so many players, cases, examples over the course of years, there can only be a systematic problem in how the NT is dealing (or not dealing) with the mental side of trying to win sporting contests.
     
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  11. yuon

    yuon Regular Member

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    Japan came into this Olympics badly prepared, and I don't know if the coaches and players did everything they could to be prepared or not, but one thing for sure is that the system failed them. I don't particularly think the national team/corporate teams system is bad, and I would say the system works pretty well in normal time, but, unfortunately, it was not made to adapt to the special situation that the world has been in for the past 1 1/2 years. The players were left/forced to be on their own for too long and that had left them rusty when it comes to real matches, and for those who were trying to come back from injuries like Yamaguchi or Momota, they really had no chance to get back to their old forms. The forced withdrawal from the Thailand tournaments and Hirota's injury right before the Olympics added more salt to the wound. I thought that the NBA should have staged an internal tournament to help the players prepare for the pressure of competition, but instead of staging one, even the corporate team competition was canceled. Given the rising cases in Japan and the public sentiment against the Olympics, the organizer probably felt like they had no choice. Either way, it was another unfortunate turn of event.

    And then, of course, the elephant in the room -- the mental problem. People like us watching at home can clearly see it, so it's impossible for the coaches to not realize that almost all of their players have some form of a mental block or another. Momota might be mentally strong when playing his own match, but he crumbles when more than his own match is on the line. Clear examples of this are his losses to Takeshita Riichi, when a position in the A team was on the line, and the Sudirman Cup final, when the team's survival was on the line, so I can't say I didn't see this tragedy coming. In fact, I was afraid it would happen, and it did. No matter how out of form he is, he shouldn't have lost in the group stage like that, and I don't mean who he lost to, but how he lost it. Yamaguchi has problems closing out a game when she's under pressure, regardless of how good of a lead she has or how much she has been outscoring her opponent coming into the end game. In fact, I get more nervous when she is in a good position than when it is only a couple of points lead because more often than not, she will go on a losing streak soon after. 2018 WC SF loss to Sindhu, Surdirman Cup losses to Chochuwong and CYF, 2019 MO Final loss to TTY are just a few examples. And then there's Nagamatsu, especially Matsumoto. No explanation needed here.

    I don't think any single party is at fault here because the pandemic and the injuries to Momota and Hirota played a big role in all of this, since MS and WD are probably the two disciplines that Japan was counting on the most for the gold, and I would hope that nobody would be forced to or feel forced to take responsibility for this outing, although Japan is pretty notorious for this practice. I don't want a purging of the coaching staff either like some countries tend to do whenever they have bad results. Rather, I'd want to see a postmortem of what went wrong and the problems addressed. What happened had already happened and how the team will rebound from this is more important than playing the blame game. Japan has a chance to make up for this short coming with the two team competitions coming up (if they're not canceled or boycotted) so I really do hope, for the good of badminton in Japan, that the team can keep badminton alive in the national interest.

    Well, I wrote an essay there, but I guess this is just my way of coming to terms with what happened this week. Last, but not least, I'd like to suggest that PJB considers adding boot camp to the training menu. That should kill both the physical and mental birds with one stone :p.
     
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  12. Sundis

    Sundis Regular Member

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    .-
     
    #2252 Sundis, Jul 31, 2021
    Last edited: Oct 29, 2023
  13. Cunning Linguist

    Cunning Linguist Regular Member

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    @yuon Could subscribe to this word for word, except for the "Momota's not good when playing for Japan" part. He has an outstanding record playing for Japan and won many important matches against top players, including two TC finals.
     
  14. samkool

    samkool Regular Member

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    two words: conflicting agendas.

    corporations own the players.
    nba wants the players.

    you tell me who's in charge here...
     
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  15. yuon

    yuon Regular Member

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    I totally don't mean he's not good when playing for Japan in team events. In fact, he has an outstanding record, and I was kind of sad when his no-loss record in team events was broken. There were subtle differences between that particular Sudirman Cup final and the other team matches. During the Thomas Cup, Japan was the underdog and the team's survival did not rest on his shoulders. He had room to breath. Plus, he was not the ace of the team, and if I'm not mistaken, the youngest, in fact, so he did not have the same type of pressure. In 2018 TC, again, Japan was the underdog, he was only starting to make his come back, and he played first. In both cases, he was not seen as the sure point that Japan can bank on. In 2018, Japan actually came in as the No. 1 seed, Japan's strongest chance ever to win the SC, and viewed by many as the favorite to win. Add to that the fact that Japan lost the first two matches, and it was up to him, the ace, to keep Japan in the final, and that's how we ended up with a pressure cooker type of situation. He mentioned in an interview once, that it was tough for him to watch China celebrated across the net from him. He had also mentioned before that it took him a number of months before he was able to deal with the pressure that comes with WR1 ranking. He looks confident on court, but in fact, he gets nervous. He himself said that when an interviewer mentioned that he doesn't look nervous at all on court.
    Did it sound like I was putting him down? Totally did not mean that in any way. I was just trying to point out the amount of pressure and expectation he was under, and I do empathize with the situation he was in. I was not trying to put Yamaguchi down either. She's one of my favorites and it pains me to see her always falters right before the finish line. Both Momota and Yamaguchi continues to have my full support.
     
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  16. yuon

    yuon Regular Member

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    In a regular year, I think the system balances itself pretty well. Unless the NBA can afford to pay the players regular salary, it is good that the players have a regular source of income from the corporations. The corporation system allows more people to become badminton players as a job, so I'd think it's a pretty good thing for the sport in Japan. Not all players can afford to go independent like Okuhara, especially so for new comers. Players who are older or can't perform at the top anymore can still play for the corporate teams instead of being cast aside to fend for themselves once they're deemed not worth being spent money on anymore like what we see in some other countries.

    Overall, I think both the corporations and NBA have the same bigger agenda, in that they both want their players to be successful on the world stage, because who wouldn't want to have a world top 10 on their corporate team. The players on the A team actually spend more time away from than with their corporate team during the year. The pandemic presented an unprecedented situation. Nobody knew how COVID would affect the body last year, so as much as I would want to blame the corporate teams for pulling their players out of the Denmark Open and all the training camps, I can see why they wanted to play it safe. Perhaps, an outcome of this would be to let the players have more say in such decisions. No system is perfect, but they can always be improved.
     
  17. kurako

    kurako Regular Member

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    The problem with corporations is that they have their clean image to worry about. Had any of the players contracted COVID-19, it would have damaged their reputations. Hence, no risks were taken in this very risk-adverse society, probably to the detriment of the team's performance. It is a question of where to draw the line. And, also a question of 'who' should draw this line. The NBA? The corporate team employers? Or the athletes themselves?

    Coming into the Olympics, Japan had players ranked in the top five for all of the categories. The NBA had at one point projected six medals, three of them gold. Furthermore, the NBA received an "S" ranking, the highest possible, for Government funding aimed at the Olympics. And the result was one bronze medal.

    A couple of articles have started coming out, which attempt to analyse exactly what went wrong. Unsurprisingly, some fingers are being pointed at NBA cronyism.
     
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  18. trizzforce

    trizzforce Regular Member

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    I'll stay tuned to this @kurako If you can spare some time, do update us regularly. Thanks as always.
     
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  19. samkool

    samkool Regular Member

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    obviously it does based on pre-pandemic results. i was addressing your original point where you stated:
    so where/how has it failed through this past outlying year?
     
  20. yuon

    yuon Regular Member

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