For reasons known best to the Badminton Association of Malaysia, I was verbally informed that no accreditation will be given to me as a blogger but I am free to apply and be provided with accreditation as a writer or contributor for a magazine. And the official was kind enough to even offer me a Guest pass in order to gain access to Stadium Putra for the Malaysian Open.
However I humbly declined the offer, stating that I either be granted a media pass as a blogger or none at all. And today being a free entry, I have saved some hard earned money by not purchasing a ticket to view matches today.
But to be safe, I have purchased tickets for the next two days, Wednesday and Thursday, to enable me to watch and report the action from the spectators stand. From Friday onwards I shall watch matches on cable TV and try to provide assessment of the proceedings the way I view it.
So life goes on and lets now look at the morning session of the qualification day.....
There are bound to be issues on Day One of any event and it was no different at Stadium Putra as the portable scoreboards gave loads of headaches to the organisors as can be seen from the picture above, with the third column missing, thus causing the fans to either pay attention to the chair umpire or watch the main scoreboard to keep abreast with the scores. Then there was also the irritation of the courts not taped well and it caused the Malaysian doubles pair of Mohd Lufti Zain Abdul Khalid/Vontus Indra Mawan a place in the next round of the qualifiers.
The Malaysian pair were leading the Thai pairing of Patipat Chalardchalem/Nipithon Puangpuapech 15-13 in the rubber, when play had to be stopped and that handed the initiative to the Thai pair who went on to win the tie.
That setback aside, there was some encouraging performances from the Malaysians and it started from mixed doubles pair Tan Aik Quan/Lai Pei Jing who defeated Indonesia's Markis Kido/Pia Zebadiah Bernadeth 21-15,21-18.
And Lydia Cheah too proved that she is made out of sterner stuff as she came back from a set down to defeat India's PV Sindhu 17-21,21-16,21-18 in 46 minutes.
Liew Darren too accounted for another Indian, this time disposing the challenge of RMV Gurusaidutt 21-16,13-21,25-23.
So things are looking good and life goes on..... for as long as the prepaid internet continues to work and the laptop battery lasts...
