More than half of the badminton Olympic points competition, the situation of the national feather is tight! The number of seats is likely to fall below an all-time low
After the French Open Badminton Championships, the year-long badminton Olympic points competition at the Paris Olympics ended the first half of the event. What is not optimistic is that if the individual Olympic rankings continue to maintain the current situation in six months, the national feather will not be able to obtain full quotas in the men's doubles and women's doubles events, once this happens, the national feather will fall to the lowest point in the history of the single Olympic Games.
The badminton competition at the Paris Olympics consists of five events: men's singles, women's singles, men's doubles, women's doubles and mixed doubles. The rules stipulate that the same team can obtain a maximum of two quota places in both men's and women's singles events, provided that the qualified athlete is ranked in the top 16 Olympic points. Each of the three doubles events will also be eligible for a maximum of two quota places, provided that they are ranked in the top 8 in Olympic points. The Paris Olympic Points Race runs from the beginning of May 2023 to the end of April 2024, just over halfway through the year-long series.
On Tuesday, the Badminton World Federation announced its latest Olympic standings. Li Shifeng, Shi Yuqi and Weng Hongyang ranked 3rd, 4th and 14th in the men's singles ranking list respectively, Chen Yufei, He Bingjiao, Han Yue and Wang Zhiyi ranked 2nd, 5th, 7th and 14th in the women's singles ranking list, and Zheng Siwei/Huang Yaqiong, Feng Yanzhe/Huang Dongping and Jiang Zhenbang/Wei Yaxin ranked 1st, 3rd and 6th in mixed doubles respectively. Under normal times, the national feathers in the above three events can get full quotas, and all that needs to be dealt with is how to do a good job of 2 out of 3 or 2 out of 4.
In contrast, the men's doubles and women's doubles events are much more complicated, as only one pair is currently ranked in the top eight of the rankings, with Leung Wai Keng/Wang Chang and Liu Yuchen/Ou Xuanyi ranking 4th and 9th respectively in the men's doubles rankings, and Chen Qingchen/Jia Yifan, Zhang Shuxian/Zheng Yu and Liu Shengshu/Tan Ning ranking 1st, 9th and 10th respectively in the women's doubles rankings.
Assuming that it is now the closing time of the Olympic points competition, Liu Yuchen/Ou Xuanyi, Zhang Shuxian/Zheng Yu, Liu Shengshu/Tan Ning will pass by the Olympic tickets, and then Leung Wai Keng/Wang Chang and Chen Qingchen/Jia Yifan will face the unfavorable situation of fighting alone.
At the Tokyo Olympics three years ago, Han Chengkai/Zhou Haodong, the second main player in the men's doubles of the national feathers, failed to break into the top eight of the Olympic standings, resulting in only Li Junhui/Liu Yuchen winning the Olympic quota for the men's doubles. The nine quota places were awarded to the national team at the Tokyo Olympics, the lowest in the history of Barcelona 1992, but there was no mixed doubles competition at the Barcelona Olympics, so nine quota places were the lowest in the history of the Olympic Games. The situation is clear, before the end of the Paris Olympic points competition, if the national team is still unable to change the passive situation of the men's doubles and women's doubles events, the record of eight Olympic quota places will fall below the record low.
The men's doubles and women's doubles pairs each currently have one in the top eight of the Olympic standings, but the key issue is that the national team has not been able to produce a strong second doubles in these two events. Since 2017, Chen Qingchen/Jia Yifan has been ranked among the top women's doubles pairs, but the national feather women's doubles has not been able to emerge a second pair of top pairs over the years, and the average strength of the two or three pairs of women's doubles is not as good as that of South Korea and Japan. Men's doubles also exposed this weakness, Liu Yuchen and his former partner Li Junhui won the world championships, Olympic runner-up, Li Junhui retired after the Tokyo Olympics, Liu Gai and Ou Xuanyi teamed up, the two once rushed to second in the world rankings, but in recent months their impact momentum has weakened significantly. If the new twin towers fail to bounce back, the men's doubles team will not be able to qualify for two consecutive Olympic Games.
(Wang Quanli)