THANK goodness for the Thomas and Uber Cups, as ‘American Idol’s’ dullness and yawn-inducing performances have been driving me up the wall.This week, instead of religiously watching ‘American Idol’, I switched channels to watch the ‘live’ telecasts of the Malaysian team playing in the quarter-finals of the Thomas Cup, which proved to be a wise move.
At the time of writing, the semi-finals had not started yet and therefore I cannot comment on the games. I will simply give my two cents’ worth on the quarter-finals.
On Tuesday, the whole nation witnessed a historical event. For the first time ever, we lost to the Japanese in the Thomas Cup. If my memory serves me correctly, Malaysia had never lost to Japan before, not until that fateful day.
If you watched the match, you must be wondering why Mohd Zakry Abdul Latif and Mohd Fairuzizuan were selected for the Thomas Cup instead of other higher-ranked players. Former national doubles star Razif Sidek actually said that Ong Soon Hock and Hoon Thien How should be playing instead of Zakry-Fairuzizuan.
It was a total letdown. Apparently, according to the grapevine, the excuse given by them during an interview after the match was along the line of: “…belum menyesuaikan diri dalam gelanggang…” On home ground? Seriously?
Emotions ran high at the Putra Stadium in Bukit Jalil when Malaysian supporters openly showed their disappointment by booing the players in unison. A friend who was there to watch the matches said that he regretted paying to watch such a defeat and therefore, watched the rest of the matches the next day in the comfort of his home.
Rumour had it that there was commotion after the interview, when Mohd Fairuzizuan lost his cool and retaliated at one of the supporters in the stadium but was stopped and then led out of the hall. The video of the incident has been widely circulated on Facebook and YouTube, of course.
After that, we saw Mohd Hafiz Hashim in the third singles, playing poorly with weak smashes and errors all over. He could not lift his game. Malaysian supporters from inside and outside the stadium were fuming mad. A lot of people criticised him for giving weak, ‘girlie’ smashes.
Well, he lost the game. Maybe he was de-motivated after Malaysia was defeated by Japan earlier.
On Wednesday, the game started with an exciting match between Malaysia’s Datuk Lee Chong Wei and Denmark’s veteran Peter Gade. Malaysia’s victory in this first match had motivated the rest of the national players. We won again in the first doubles through Koo Kien Kiat and Tan Boon Heong, who gave Malaysia a 2-0 lead.
In the second singles, we could see that veteran Wong Choong Han played his best although not as well as during his golden era a decade back, but much better than his performance the day before, which he himself admitted was uncertain and weak.
Unfortunately, Denmark managed to reduce the deficit when Jorgensen defeated Wong with 22-20, 16-21 and 21-18. Thus, we were hoping for the win in the second doubles in order to put Malaysia into the semi-finals.
However, things were looking bleak when scratch pair, Hoon and Zakry lost the second doubles match. In the first set, they seemed to do well with 26-24 but their skills, speed and communication deteriorated from second set onwards.
Therefore, Hafiz had to take on the challenge in the third singles to send Malaysia into the semi-finals.
Facebookers were anxious due to Hafiz’s unsatisfactory performance the day before. The Facebook wall was flooded with comments and criticisms. I sat at the edge of my seat throughout the game.
To cut a long story short, Hafiz was the man of the hour when he managed to keep Malaysia in the game with a 3-2 win over Denmark. Supporters from all over Malaysia celebrated.
Apart from the idiot box, there were non-stop ‘live’ commentaries on Facebook, Twitter (which could be seen on Facebook walls), in various forums and even SMS-es, all at the same time, sometimes by the same person! Talk about multi-tasking.
It was an intense quarter-finals on Wednesday. According to the criticisms and comments left by people on Facebook, Twitter, forums and SMS-es, the players surprisingly fared better on that day.
That just showed that Malaysians are as passionate about badminton as football, if not more. People had their eyes glued to the screen of the television from the start of the game and at the same time updated their status on Facebook and Twitter with one hand while SMS-ing with the other.
At the time of writing, I am looking forward to watching the semi-finals. Again, according to comments and criticisms online, the Malaysian team needs Lady Luck to be with them to win because China is known for their strong badminton squad.
However, there could be surprises, we never know.
Unfortunately, we lost 3-0 to China, who then proceed to win the Thomas Cup 2010!
He has posted on this today!
