Clouds of gloom & Shouts of joy

Last night we witnessed the crashing of our remaining two men singles in World Championships. Can't help but feel frustrated. One lost to a player seeded 7 places beneath him, and the other lost to an unseeded Indian player (the one who shockingly eliminated Indonesia's Taufik Hidayat earlier). Again and again, we have always fallen short in crucial stages and tournaments. Sigh. I think that sometimes we become too obsessed with chasing and beating bigger names that we tend to dismiss others too easily.

The thing that was most disappointing of all was the fact that Lee Chong Wei lost to Sony Dwi Kuncoro without putting up much of a fight. And newspapers report that he blamed the head coach for putting too much unnecessary pressure on him to win. So he thinks he's the only one being pressured to win? Kinda ridiculous, if you ask me. I bet it's many other reasons.

Although I may not like Lin Dan much (mainly because he's always eliminating our players from tournaments hahahaa), I think Lee Chong Wei needs to learn from his example. Ok. He may not be the most charismatic character on court. But he delivers when it matters. And he does it with tons more expectations from others than Lee has. He's the defending world champion. He's been world no 1 for God knows how many centuries. He has the team and coaches counting on him. He has the whole China population counting on him. The whole world is expecting him to win. He has more to lose. And yet, he delivers.

Or maybe if emulating your competitor is not a good idea. Think about the all-rounder, Sun Jun (player back in 1990s).

All this while, we've always had two so-called jinxes. One, no Malaysian woman has EVER become the world champion. Two, no Malaysian woman has EVER beaten the world champion. Yesterday, in the most unusual turn of events, our Malaysian player defied the odds and defeated the defending world champion China's Xie Xingfang (21-10, 21-8). It was the single most lopsided match I've seen with Xie Xingfang being - oddly and ironically - dominated and not the dominatrix. It was really her off day, making one too many unforced errors. So today, Wong Mew Choo has defeated a world champion, breaking all skepticism and pessimistic views, remarks on our local women badminton. Who knows in near future we'll have another breakthrough.

Good thing our men doubles defeated that Danish pair. Full of dirty little tricks and degrading badminton quality with their utter silliness. Delaying serves. Keep delaying getting ready to receive service like hundreds thousands of times. Changing shuttles, don't wanna change shuttles. Talking to the umpire unecessarily. Trying to get popularity vote har? So super annoying, irritating and unsporting behaviour. Serve them right to get booed by the crowd and probably the millions more who were watching from home. Even the commentator was going, "C'mon! Let's get on with this!".

Should ban them. Or tape their mouths. Or give them both red cards for lousy attitude and stupid behaviour. They have talent, but it's such a sorry sight to watch them having to resort to silly tactics like this as a strategy to win. I don't care if people say that those so-called psychological tactics are part of the game. Or whatever other excuses they give to justify them. It's pathetic and a disgrace to the sport.