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It is not often we beat Australia in
Sport consistently but in Badminton we have done so consistently
over many years. Now with a new young team we have
done so again, to qualify from the Oceania Group for the
Badminton World Team Finals in Jakarta, Indonesia starting May
11th to May 18th. In the Thomas Cup it was very close with
NZ just winning by one match.
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There
are two teams and two competitions The Mens (Thomas Cup) and Womens (Uber).
They are two of the toughest team events in badminton. It is similar in
some ways to the Tennis Davis Cup and has a 3 singles and two doubles
format.
In Jakarta they will be
joined by the powerhouses of world badminton from countries such
as China, Malaysia, Denmark, Indonesia and Korea. For
NZ players it is a brand new environment - packed stadiums
with people sitting in the aisles just to get a glimpse of
play, children mobbing players from whatever country just to
get an autograph and media covering every inch of the
tournament. At The Uber and Thomas Cups Badminton is the Real
Deal and the players are Super Stars. |
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It is not only off court that things
will be different - on court the NZers will face noise from packed stadiums of
over 15,000 people and probably high heat and humidity.
They will see & play against some of the best in the world, it
is a rare and tremendous experience for NZ. That's if the
full team can go. Although both have teams have qualified
and despite great efforts from Badminton NZ and
SPARC there is still a shortfall of several thousand dollars.
The average age of
the two NZ teams is around just 22, the youngest 16 the oldest 27.
The lowest rank combination is ranked 150 in the world with most
well in the top 100 and the highest ranked 32.
Qualifying for such a prestigious tournament is something to be
proud of, it would be a huge waste if the team or some of it's
players could not make the trip because of lack of
funding. Most of the team are currently training, studying
and working full time and some are currently overseas competing
internationally and have less than 7 weeks to raise the money. Many
of them already have to raise thousands of dollars to fund their
tournament season (some up to $20,000 a year). |
 (1) |
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 (2) |
Funding issues are not new for sports teams however that doesn't
mean something can't be done about it. There is something
we and you can do to help ensure our top players get to compete
against the world's best.
Auckland has put together a fundraising raffle for it's Auckland
players in the NZ team. All proceeds will go to the 7 Auckland players
(4 women and 3 men).
Tickets are just
$2 will be on sale
at Gillies Ave from March
17th to May 7th with the draw on May 9th at 5pm at Gillies
Avenue just prior to the start of the Thomas and Uber Cups.
There are 35 prizes ranging from $500 in value to $20 as
well as over 50 spot prizes. |
You can track the
progress of the raffle fund (and view the Auckland NZ player
profiles) on the front page of our
website
www.auckbad.co.nz. A big thank you to our
sponsors of the raffle prizes. For more details on the
raffle, how you can win and our sponsors -
click here
or to get a ticket you can email
cliff.
You can also make a general donation to the whole team which we
will pass on to Badminton NZ.
The Teams:
NZ Thomas Cup Team -
John Moody, Joe Wu, Craig Cooper, Henry Tam, Nathan Hannam,
Kevin Dennerly-Minturn
NZ Uber Cup
Team - Rachel Hindley, Michelle Chan,
Jessica Jongowisastro , Renee Flavell, Donna Cranston, Emma
Rodgers, Danielle Barry
Coach /
Manager
- Tjitte Weistra, Coach - Thana
Arikrishnan
Team Seedings:
Thomas
Cup: 1 China, 2 Indonesia, 3 Malaysia, 4 Denmark, 5 South Korea,
6 Japan, 7 Canada, 8 Germany, 9 Thailand, 10 England, 11 New
Zealand, 12 Nigeria
Uber Cup: 1
China, 2 Japan, 3 South Korea, 4 Malaysia, 5 Indonesia, 6
Germany, 7 Denmark, 8 Hong Kong, 9 Netherlands, 10 New Zealand,
11 USA, 12 South Africa
Picture References
(1) Michelle Chan and Rachel Hindley
(2) Renee Flavell and Partner Craig Cooper
- although not playing together both are in the respective NZ
teams. (Craig and Renee are also working hard to qualify
for the Beijing Olympics - see Editorial section). |
