Weather was very nice today! The venue is a well known event arena in Hong Kong (Coliseum) which looks like an inverted pyramid. Next to the venue is the main railway terminus with trains going up into China. Just a bit of a further walk away is a shopping mall. There is a food court there where practically all the players go to have food. Typically, Hong Kong style is to never to be too far away from food! The sponsors of the Superseries, Metlife, also have a stand here. I must confess, I never really heard of Metlife before they started sponsoring the Superseries. After visiting the stand, I found out that they are an American insurance company offering various insurance products. The other thing is they signed up with the characters from Peanuts to be used in advertising. So, now you know why Snoopy is given to the winners of the Superseries and not Ironman.. At considerably less effort than to win a super series, members of the public were able win some prizes by little game of hitting the shuttlecock through Snoopy's racquet - a task made harder with the breeze around. The podium looks a bit sparse but it is only qualifiers today.
Here is a picture of the stadium on the left, train terminus to the rear, hotel and shopping mall to the right. Yonex set up a shop this year but it's tiny and even today, with few people around, there was a queue to get in. It looks woefully inadequate for the future days. I didn't even bother going in to look around. You select your stuff inside, pay, and collect outside. Seriously, on that podium, there is a lot of excess space for other sponsors to set up marquees and such. Would be good for a future world championships!
Despite the nice weather, the main action was indoors. The practice area was very crowded with only two practice courts for players to get used to conditions. There are practice courts at other locations that the players have to take a shuttle bus to. (not pictured).
So, just a few more pics of the day's action. Japanese sensation Akane Yamaguchi had a little hiccup in the second game. She had a few problems with timing the shuttle after the change of ends but came through. Good to get a preliminary game in new conditions.
This year the backdrop is the same, wonderful quality. However, wish they hadn't used white as part of the background. Makes it hard to see the shuttle for certain shots.
Nice to see the less well known players get a chance at a superseries. Good to see Canadians Nyl Yakura and Kevin Li in the fray. Nyl played well - has he had an ankle injury? Noticed his left ankle strapped up. Kevin needs to work on keeping the quality shot under pressure. I don't think they played bad but had just fewer ideas when the screws were tightened. Notice in the second last photo of this series Nyl's face being obscured by a hand - it's a tough life being a photographer!
Superb work.. Those pics are impeccable.. Especially the one of AY.. Thanx for sharing it with us.... Hope the last stopage of SS tourneys proves to be a great destination for our players..the recently concluded CHN SSP must have squeezed all the energy juice from their pulp still hope to see great and close encounters..
Thanks. I am told HK is always a popular destination for the players. This year is a bit of a problem though with some of the top players unable to attend for various reasons. The local audience is very appreciative of good play no matter what association so it's a good chance for somebody to endear themselves to the HK audience.
Ahh yes, Nyl suffered an ankle injury in Orlando in his mixed Semi Finals against Phillip Chew/Jamie Subandhi.
