Vietnamese badminton players have not been well-represented in the top 32 in recent years. Is that about to change? Will Vietnam badminton change the status quo soon?
Vietnam is no longer inside the top 25 on the BWF Badminton Team Nations ranking. That must be very disappointing for the badminton-crazed Vietnamese.
In the past, we’ve seen men’s singles player Nguyễn Tiến Minh do very well on the world stage. In 2013 he won the bronze medal at the World Championships in Guangzhou, China (he was defeated by the great Lin Dan in the semifinal). In recent years none of the talented Vietnamese men’s singles players have managed to get inside the top 20 on the ranking list.
Ladies’ single player Nguyễn Thùy Linh recently won the Vietnam Open BWF Super 100 tournament. As of August 2024, she is number 26 on the BWF World Ranking list. At 26 years of age, she might be able to work her way into the top 20.
Other female players from Vietnam are mostly outside the top 100 in the world badminton ranking.
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Why is Vietnam trailing other Asian badminton nations?
For starters, badminton IS very popular in Vietnam. So it is not for the lack of skilled players and enthusiasm. Because of the huge number of badminton players in the country, Vietnam has the potential to produce loads of international top badminton players. Yet it hasn’t happened in recent years.
Our sources suggest that the lackluster performance of Vietnamese badminton has to do with the organization of the sport. In other words, how the sport is organized in general.
Favoritism, resistance to modernization, misallocation of funds, the lack of a proper tournament structure, and the overall method of organizing the sport in Vietnam are seemingly some of the reasons why Vietnamese badminton is trailing most other Asian badminton nations.
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