Where should China's badminton head for?
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E-mail People's Daily Online, January 6, 2013
The fate of badminton has attracted great attention due to the downsizing of Olympic Games. The internal conflicts of Badminton World Federation have seriously affected the reputation of the sport in the international arena in recent years. In addition, the negative attitude of badminton players at London Olympic Games also endangered the sport.
When talking about the rumor that badminton was likely to be removed from the Olympic Games in an interview with a micro-blog website, Lin Dan said that he will make movies if the rumor comes true. “Otherwise I do not have things to do,” Lin said with a smile.
Lin seems too pessimistic about the prospect of badminton. His statements such as “One of the main reasons for the marginalization of badminton at the Olympic Games is that the sport has not yet been promoted enough” and “Badminton does not have a particularly high status in the international sports arena” are very different from the opinion of Li Yongbo, the head coach of Chinese national badminton team who said badminton is impossible to be removed from the Olympic considering the attention it recieves and its TV audience rating.
The removal of badminton from the Olympic Games will not have a significant impact on them. However, it will be a big blow to the unknown professional players who are conducting hard trainings and hope to make glorious achievements one day, and cause an earth-shaking change in the badminton sport that has different national treatments for being or nor being an Olympic event.
Lin has reaped a high payoff from the sport. In 2012, he married Xie Xingfang after eight-year courtship, published a new book titled “Until the End of the World” and obtained the master’s degree granted by Huaqiao University. His commercial status has doubled, earning over 10 million yuan of advertising revenue as a top-level advertising spokesperson. All of the achievements are related with the halo of being an Olympic champion.
The removal of badminton from the Olympic Games will be a big blow to numerous professional badminton players who hope to win an honor for China on the Olympic Games and earn a better future for themselves. Though the international contests like “All England badminton championships” have no small influence in the world, they cannot be compared with the Olympic Games in China. Though badminton is a popular sport in China and has a large number of fans, it is hard to be highly valued by the governments and sports authorities at all levels in China once becoming a non-Olympic sport, and the fate of people cannot be changed just because of a gold medal.
Where will China’s badminton go? Should the system of training Olympic talents in China be adjusted? Should the views of sports be changed to integrate with the world? China has numerous people who long to become Lin but will never become Lin. There is an old saying in China, “Those who do not plan for the future will find trouble at their doorstep.”
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