DJARUM INDONESIA OPEN SS

As the Super Series tour moves on to Indonesia, the tournament has suffered a similar fate to that of its sister event, the Singapore Open Super Series, with multiple withdrawals. The men’s event has been worst affected with the withdrawal of Singapore winner Lee Chong Wei, Andrew Smith, Jin Chen and the home favourite and Olympic Champion Taufik Hidayat. There were complete redraws in the men’s singles qualification tournament as all the seeds were promoted to the main draw and, likewise, the women’s doubles event was redrawn as the competition was without its 8 compulsory seeds. However, there are sure to be some intense battles as the tournament kicks off with every player attempting to find form and send out signals ahead of the Olympics.

By Mark Phelan, Badzine Correspondent. Photos: Badmintonphoto (archives)

As Lee Chong Wei heads home after his Singapore triumph, the mantle of tournament favourite in the men’s singles event is handed to Bao Chunlai (photo) of China. In a repeat of the 2006 Korea Open final, Bao Chunlai plays Muhammad Roslin Hashim in the opening round but he is sure to be looking beyond that and relishing a potential second round meeting with, new kid on the block, Nguyen Tien Minh of Vietnam. The Vietnamese player has impressed this year and is sure to find himself inside the world's top 20 sooner rather than later.


Simon Santoso, the beaten Singapore finalist, finds himself playing yet another European in the first round. This time it’s the improving Czech player Petr Koukal who showed good form in Singapore when beating Lu Yi of China in the opening round. The top end of the draw has an interesting first round match between Peter Gade of Denmark and Scott Evans of Ireland. Both players regularly spar against each other in Denmark and Evans’s coach, former world number 1 doubles player Jim Laugesen, is a long-standing friend of the great Dane. Should Gade advance to the second round he will probably come up against another player he knows instinctively from Denmark, Jan O Jorgensen.

Sony Dwi Kuncoro makes his return to the Super Series after missing Singapore and is installed as number 4 seed. If he is to advance in the tournament, he will have to get by qualifier Hartanto in the opening round. Hartanto himself has shown good form in Europe lately by getting to the final in Toulouse and the semi-finals in Spain. A meeting with either Joachim Persson or Anup Sridhar awaits Dwi Kuncoro in the second round and, should he progress through to the semi-final, he will most probably meet the in-form Peter Gade.

In the women’s event, we see the return of some of the top Chinese players and in Zhu Lin and Zhang Ning the tournament has its number 1 and 2 seeds respectively. The two Chinese players are most likely playing to book their place on the Chinese team for Beijing and this is sure to be a distraction for both of them. Clear favourite based on form is sure to be Tine Rasmussen from Denmark. After winning her third Super Series event this year not only is she favourite for the Indonesian title but must now be installed as favourite to lift gold in Beijing. Rasmussen has a tricky first round match against Yao Jie of the Netherlands and the Dane would be scheduled to meet Zhang Ning in the semi-final.

Pi Hongyan will be hoping to bounce back after a substandard performance in Singapore but to do so she will have to overcome two of the form players from Singapore, Saina Nehwal and Xing Auying, who reached the semi-final and quarter-final respectively. Throw into the mix a potential meeting with number 8 seed Yip Pui Yin of Hong Kong and the French number 1 will have to show some grit and determination of she is to advance to the semi-finals this time around.

The men’s doubles sees the return world number 1 pairing of Markis Kido and Hendra Setiawan and in the absence of Paaske and Rasmussen, their nearest challengers for the title are sure to be fellow Indonesians and world number 7 pairing of Alvent Yulianto and Luluk Hadiyanto. Both Indonesian pairings will be looking over their shoulders at the recent Singapore winners Abdul Latif and Mohd Tazari to see can the Malaysians repeat the form that saw them crowned the unlikely winners last week in Singapore. The Danes, as always, are well-represented in the men’s doubles draw with four pairs and their most likely route to success is through number 7 seeds Boe and Mogensen.

The women’s doubles event has been rocked with withdrawals that forced a full event re-draw by the organising committee. With the absence of both finalists from Singapore, the tag of favourites for the title falls on yet another Chinese pair, world number 2 Wei Yili and Zhang Yawen. Second seeds for the event are the Japanese pin-up pair of Kumiko Ogura and Reiko Shiota, who will be desperate to show some sort of form that reflects their world ranking ahead of the Beijing Olympics. It has been a poor season for the Japanese darlings with their last major semi-final appearance being almost a year ago at the World Championships. Vita Marissa and Lilyana Natsir will be hoping to please their home crowd and go one better than last week and claim a final spot to give the energetic Indonesia, supporters something to shout about come finals day.

In the mixed event, Nova Widianto and Lilyana Natsir (photo) will be hoping to do the double and claim their home Super Series event to match their win last week in Singapore and send out clear signals to the rest of the world that they are the form pair ahead of the Olympics in August. Gao Ling and Zheng Bo are sure to be the Indonesians' major threat this week in the absence of Clark and Kellogg and Emms and Robertson. Europe will be looking to the Danish pair of Rasmus Bonde and Helle Nielsen to continue their Singapore form and an outside bet for the title must be Robert Blair and Imogen Bankier.

The tournament proper kicks off tomorrow, June 18^th, with the first round and you can follow all the live scores HERE

source: http://www.badzine.info