Oly: Poor results no surprise as badminton chiefs eye future

AAP General News (Australia)
08-24-2008
Oly: Poor results no surprise as badminton chiefs eye future

By Charisse Ede

BEIJING, Aug 24 AAP - Australia's badminton chiefs always said their Olympic team would
struggle to win a match in Beijing.

They were right on the money.

All six of Australia's badminton players were sent packing after the first round at
the 2008 Games.

In fact, women's singles specialist Erin Carroll was out less than 12 hours after the
Olympic flame had been lit - 2-0 to a higher-ranked Spaniard.

Australia's greatest hope, men's singles player Stuart Gomez, managed to hold match
point in his first round clash, but was unable to wrap it up and eventually lost 2-1.

The women's and men's doubles went down in resounding fashion. The women's pair of
Tania Luiz and Eugenia Tanaka took just 12 points off their World No.8 opponents the Japanese
in losing 2-0.

The men, the last to play their match on day four of the Games, were no competition
for Poland, going down 2-0.

The medals were divided up between the favourites: China, Indonesia, South Korea and Malaysia.

Badminton Australia (BA) is already looking beyond Beijing, and even London 2012, to
build the competitiveness of the national team.

Last year, then chief executive Damian Kelly told AAP they were more focused on building
a stronger team for the 2016 Olympics and 2014 Commonwealth Games.

"2016 is where we're looking to make a change," he said.

"We're looking to make some small changes in the next eight years ... with potential
medallists at 2016 and 2014 at the Commonwealth Games."

In July this year, current BA chief executive Paul Brettell said Australia's greatest
achievement at Beijing was just qualifying for the event.

"The trouble with badminton is it's a massive sport in the Asian region," he said.

"We have always seen the Olympics as part of the four-year cycle. In our case, we go
to the Commonwealth Games, and the Olympics are somewhere in between."

They have a lot of work to do before 2014.

AAP ce/jmt/nh

KEYWORD: OLY08 BAD AUST WRAP (REPEAT)

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