Badminton Asia team field dwindles as Indian ladies back out

India’s women’s team has decided to give next week’s Badminton Asia Team Championships a miss, according to a report in India Today.

Amid fears surrounding the outbreak of the novel coronavirus 2019-nCoV, the Badminton Association of India (BAI) decided to withdraw its women’s team from the upcoming Badminton Asia Team Championships in Manila, said a report late last night in India Today.  The article says that BAI had already received assurances from Badminton Asia, the event organizer, but after discussions with the players, the men’s team agreed to go ahead with the event, while the women’s team was withdrawn “was withdrawn owing to concerns showed by parents and players”.

The absence of the Indian women’s team is likely to be in addition to the blocking of participation by teams from both Hong Kong and mainland China.  Badminton Asia has made no public announcements in over a week but 6 days ago, the government of the Philippines imposed an entry ban on all foreign nationals arriving from China, Hong Kong, and Macau.

Unlike Hong Kong, the Indian women’s team is virtually assured of qualify for the Uber Cup Finals, to be held in Denmark in May.  In fact, all of the nation’s top stars, including singles aces Saina Nehwal and Pusarla Venkata Sindhu and doubles pair Sikki Reddy / Ashwini Ponnappa, had already chosen to skip the event.  In addition to having qualified for the Uber Cup, these 3 had nothing to gain toward their Olympic qualifications as individuals, as they would be unable to surpass the team event points they already have from the 2019 Sudirman Cup.

The men’s team is equally assured of qualifying for the Thomas Cup Finals on ranking points.  However, all four singles players – Srikanth Kidambi, H. S. Prannoy, Sai Praneeth, and Lakshya Sen – can benefit from team event points to use toward their Olympic qualification.  If India wants to send two men’s singles players to Tokyo, both need to be in the top 16.  Sai Praneeth is currently #11 but the #17 shuttler is a mere 4,000 points behind him, while Prannoy and Srikanth are among the 13 players within 10,000 points of the top 16.

The prospects for Hong Kong are quite dim.  Unless they reach the continental semi-finals, neither team will qualify for the Thomas and Uber Cup Finals in May.  The men’s team is currenlty very close in ranking to Thailand but could well lose this position by the time the Manila results are added in.  This will be the first time since 2012 that the Finals won’t feature both a men’s and a women’s team from Hong Kong.

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