Seoul: The Badminton Korea Association (BKA) which posted on its website looking for a new Head Coach for the Korean national badminton team on November 6th, and had subsequently fired its seven coaches via text message two days later, has once again embroiled in another scandal.
The former BKA chief coach Kang Kyung-Jin, told Korean media on Tuesday that top executives in BKA have intervened in Korea’s Asian Games player selection, but put blame on the coaches when the Korean team suffered their worst performance at the 2018 Asian Games, in which they returned home without a single badminton medal for the first time in 40 years.
Kang Kyung-Jin and other coaches had realized that it was not enough to rely on only young players in the Asian Games. The coaches preferred to call back some players who already retired from the Korean national team such as Lee Hyun-Il and Lee Yong-Dae, but some top BKA executives rejected the coaches’ proposal and said they would like to provide more exposures to young players especially when they were aiming for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
Ultimately, the final Asian Games roster list was changed by the BKA execs, and six out of the twenty Korean team players were replaced. Kang said the coaches were under a lot of pressure to participate in Asian Games with a group of young players. Even though it was probably a good intention by BKA execs, but the reality was cruel, as the Korean men’s team was knocked out by Japan 0-3 in the men’s team quarter-finals while the Korean women’s team lost to Indonesia 1-3 in the women’s team quarter-finals. Son Wan-Ho was able to make it to the quarter-finals of the men’s singles individual event, but he eventually lost to Kenta Nishimoto of Japan 17-21, 11-21.
Kang further revealed that during the 2018 World Championships that was held in Nanjing, China, although there were only six Korean players participated in the tournament, but there were total of eight BKA execs followed them to Nanjing. While the coaches and players were flying in economy class, those BKA executives flew to China through business class.
Things got even more ridiculous after the 2017 Sudirman Cup quarter-finals, when five BKA executives boarded business class that cost more than USD 22k heading back to Korea from Gold Coast, Australia, because they thought the Korean team has no chance of winning the prestigious mixed team badminton championship.
The funding from BKA were not enough to support all Korean players until the end of the Sudirman Cup, Kang was forced to spend his own money to continue supporting the players all the way to the finals.
Amazingly, the Korean team pulled off a huge miracle to beat badminton giants China 3-2 in the final, preventing China’s run of its seventh straight titles in Gold Coast, Australia.
Ironically, none of the BKA executives were in Gold Coast, Australia when their team won the Sudirman Cup.
