Olympics badminton: Eight players disqualified

I wish the governing bodies of other sports were like the Badminton World Federation.

rewards losing though. I would rank and power pair in groups of four, six or eight. Round robin the four, six, or eight teams and only the highest point total team goes forward (win loss first and total point differential second in the case of a three way tie). Losers brackets should be eliminated. I don't know how badminton is structured, but losing should never be rewarded.

when you can't throw a badminton match ?

while still trying to look legit

there was nothing subtle - what they were doing stood out a mile.

I'm betting they change the structure of the tournament next time around...

That sport is just rife with scandalous behavior.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/aug/01/london-2012-chinese-badminton-players-medals
<snip>
The attacks on Chinese and Korean badminton players are grossly unfair. They were doing their best with added cunning. Day and after day we read relentless hyperbole about the vital importance to national pride of winning: not winning a heat or a round or an exhibition, but winning medals. So obsessed is the media with this single index that the BBC has stopped displaying the medals table because it is too humiliating. This is the pastiche chauvinism of a banana republic.

Along come the Chinese, who clearly know how to win. You plan. The badminton heats were apparently staged to give an incentive, in certain circumstances, to losing games in the qualifying stages. Faced with the risk of a tougher opponent later and thus losing a medal, the players did what their tacticians said. They lost a round. I cannot see how, in sporting terms, this is any different from sprint cyclists hovering for an age on a curve, waiting for the right moment to surge forward. Anyway, the athletes were not trying to lose, they were losing so as being more likely to win.

The truth of the matter is that the actions of these badminton players are in the spirit of the modern Olympics. It is not a spectator sport but a deeply serious competition for national pride. The players should be congratulated on their ingenuity.

So obsessed is the media with this single index that the BBC has stopped displaying the medals table because it is too humiliating. This is the pastiche chauvinism of a banana republic.

Give thanks for Helen Glover and Heather Stanning - gold at last
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/aug/01/london-2012-glover-stanning-gb-gold
<snip>
Great Britain has collected its first gold medal of the London Games after Heather Stanning and Helen Glover won the coxless pairs with a stunning performance that will spark a mass outpouring of celebration and relief across the country.

One had never stepped in a rowing boat until 2008, the other will return to serve in the Royal Artillery in September. But Glover and Stanning will now go down in the record books as the first homegrown gold medallists of the London 2012 Olympics.

Not only that but, in their first Olympics, they have made British sporting history as the first female rowing gold medal winners in a sport that has reliably delivered over the years.

do please watch it. http://www.uk-telly-surfer-new-tv-drama-guide.com/2012/07/new-bbc-drama-bertie-and-dickie-stars.html

Its about the '48 Olympics and its huge fun to watch.

Looks great

"No way anyone could actually play that badly . . . it must be some sort of conspiracy"

The biggest mistake of these players was not making it look good. This kind of thing goes on in various sports that have multi-level draws which use the results of one round to determine the match-ups in the next.

So I completely disagree with disqualifying them.

I saw the story early this morning and was hoping that this would be the outcome.

Deliberately hitting the shuttlecock into the net and having volleys of only four hits does not constitute competitive play, much less competitive play worthy of the Olympics.

I've been following this since yesterday,