WORLD JUNIORS - Koreans have Other Plans

The Badminton Korea Association yesterday announced another event that will keep the best Koreans at home for the rest of the month, precluding participation in the French Open and the World Junior Championship individual competition.

Story and photos (archives): Don Hearn

As the China National Games reach their climax, Korea's top players are presently gearing up for their own annual National Sports Festival in a few days time. While it was already revealed that this tournament - in which badminton will be just one sport contributing to each province's medal tally - would take precedence over the Denmark Open and the World Junior Championship team competition, a new blip has just appeared on the domestic badminton radar.

For the first time in 10 years, Korea will be holding a tournament in which players will play to qualify for the national team in doubles. This event, which kicks off on October 28th and will run until November 7th, will be held in the southern city of Hwasun, hometown both of Lee Yong Dae and of National Team Head Coach Kim Joong Soo. Competing for the 26 eventual spots will be a total of 65 top doubles players, ranging in age from 16 to 29. Notably absent from the list, so far, is two-time World Champion Ra Kyung Min. Ra made her comeback debut in the Autumn Team Championships last month and is expected appear in the National Sports Fest team competition next week but consideration for the national team is on hold.

Virtually all of Korea's top juniors, including high school champions Choi Young Woo / Jun Yong Hyun (pictured top), will be busy in Hwasun while their counterparts from the rest of the world will be competing for gold in Alor Setar. Although the candidates include seven German Junior Open champions, Korea has not won a title at an Asian or World Junior Championship since 2007 and last year in Pune was the first time since 2000 that no Korean reached an individual final.

In July, Korea held a similar event to select players for their singles squad. One of the winners in that round, Sung Ji Hyun (pictured above), who went on to beat world #1 Zhou Mi at the Macau Open the following month, is the only top junior player who will not be trying out for the doubles team. Although Sung did not play at the Asian Junior Championships this year, she did play against the champion, Chen Xiaojia, at a tri-national event in late August but lost in two games.

Korea has not sent any names in for the World Junior Championships but Sung Ji Hyun is on the roster for the Hong Kong Open in November. Doubles changes are already down on paper, too, as Kim Min Jung (pictured), Lee Kyung Won, and Shin Baek Cheol are all due to show up in Hong Kong with new partners.

Responsibilities do not end there for the city of Hwasun, however. It was also recently named as the site of this year's Korea International Challenge. This marks the first time that an international event will be hosted by one of Korea's many small rural centres that have produced badminton stars.

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