Few non-Asian flags can be seen on the scoreboard at the Palacio de los Deportes in Santander. However, there are a few survivors who are standing up to the countries that traditionally take the top spots in the world rankings.
If we take a look event by event, we find the following brave souls who have made it through to the next round:
Men’s Singles
Alex Lanier beat China’s Zhu Xuan Chen 21-16, 21-17. The world’s youngest promising player showed why he is one of the favourites in the pools of the tournament.
Josh Nguyen beated Estonia’s Tauri Kilk, making it clear that the American continent is doing an excellent job with badminton in the new generations.
Women’s Singles
In this event, unfortunately there is only one representative from Western countries, the American Ella Lin who beat the Swiss Lucile Amiguet, but not without suffering in the match that was finally resolved by 21-10, 20-22 and 21-15.
Mixed Doubles
A lot of progress is being made in the doubles events, as shown by the results obtained, for example, by the Canadians Lai-Cheng who beat the Thai duo Meechai-Korpthamma 22-20 and 21-18.
The Danish doubles could not be missing, who also managed to get two pairs into the round of 16, SØby-RØjkjӕr and Johansen-Braüner. The Frenchmen Lucas Renoir and Tea Marguerite were also present. The Danish pair House-Kjær also joined at the last minute.
Men’s Doubles
There was a little more variety in the heroes of the men’s doubles, with representatives from Germany, such as Eckerlin and Krax, who overcame their rivals with little trouble. The Ukrainians Koluzaiev and Yeromenko had to suffer a little more in an intense match that they won in three games 8-21, 21-18 and 21-15. However, if we talk about authority, the Spaniards Dani Franco and Ruben Garcia took the victory by beating the Thai pair Bussaard-Watanaphonpaisarn by 21-19 and 21-16 in a very fast match.
Women’s doubles
The English Curtin-Van Leuven survived against the Chinese Luo Yi-Wang Yi Dao in a hard-fought match that was resolved in three games 21-18, 15-21 and 21-16.
Tommerup-Vang (Denmark) and Houreau-Pognante (France) were also victorious as Drouin-Margueritte.
There is still a lot of work to be done to overtake the old dominant nations of the badminton world. However, it is undeniable that the rest of the world is betting big and forgetting the word fear to face them.
