Badminton Association of Malaysia should offer rewarding prizes in local events to find new talent
The Badminton Association of Malaysia (BAM) needs to put rewarding incentives in the local badminton events, which will help in finding new talent to remain on the right track of progress. Due to the lack of incentives in the home event of 2011 Kuala Lumpur
Open, many top shuttlers did not participate in this event and remained busy elsewhere in different events.
In the Kuala Lumpur Open, BAM was expecting to pick-up new talent for the future of the game, but lack of interest by the senior shuttlers reduced the importance of the event. The reason is quite obvious as the prize-money for the Men’s Singles winner was
just RM 4000, whereas an amount of only RM 20,000 was given to the organising states, which seems to be ridiculous for such a significant event.
If BAM is trying to find out new faces among the younger shuttlers through such events, then it is not going to get even half of its goals. Malaysia’s Lee Chong Wei, who is currently best athlete in the world of Badminton, didn’t participate in the home
event as he was busy in China, where the China Badminton Super League was in progress. Apart from Chong Wei, there are also some other top shuttlers including, Wong Choong Hann and Muhammad Hafiz Hashim, who missed the local event as they were busy in Australian
Open Grand Prix Gold 2011.
The international events give ranking points and rewarding prize-money that draws the attention of top players from the entire planet, but local events produce better players that represent the country at international level. And if these local events do
not offer rewarding incentives to the winners then the top players will never participate in these events and the quality of the game will remain quite low.
The BAM has to work on to get more sponsors in local events. In absence of top shuttlers, the talent of young players cannot be judged in a real way. The participation of top athletes inspires the back-up shuttlers to deliver their best by playing against
them. It boosts their confidence and polishes their skills to become elite players.
If Malaysia wants to produce better players, then local events should be organized with regular intervals and rewarding incentives should be given to the best performers, which will encourage them to work hard for becoming better players to represent their
country at the international arena of badminton. Without putting lucrative rewards in the local events, the top seeds will not take interest in these tournaments which will reduce the quality of the game and new talent will not be judged in the real way.
Tags: