Lin Dan’s fifth Olympic appearance in jeopardy as BWF suspends world tour until April 12
- Badminton World Federation to call off all tournaments starting from Monday after the completion of the All England Open
- Lin will not have enough ranking points to make it to Tokyo if the world governing body goes ahead with the suspension
All-time great Lin Dan’s hopes of a fifth consecutive Olympics appearance could be over if the world governing body sticks to its cut-off time for qualifying after deciding to cancel or postpone all tournaments until April because of the coronavirus outbreak.
The 36-year-old Chinese superstar is a two-time Olympic gold medallist and although his skills have been fading with his advancing age, he is still hoping to qualify for Tokyo this summer.
But on Friday night, Badminton World Federation (BWF) announced they would cancel or postpone all tournaments from March 16 to April 12 owing to the “heightened travel and quarantine restrictions in place and the subsequent extreme logistical complications this causes to the movement of badminton athletes”.
If the BWF sticks to its plans of postponing competitions until April 12 and maintains its Olympic qualifying cut-off date of April 26, it would mean “Super Dan” would not have enough ranking points to qualify for Tokyo with the Asia Championships in Manila from April 21-26 – the first tournament after the world tour suspension is lifted – presenting another logistical nightmare for him.
The Asia Championships were originally supposed to be held in Wuhan in central China but has been moved to the Philippines capital, which has also imposed strict quarantine measures while cutting off land, domestic air and sea travel to and from Metro Manila.
Major world tour tournaments affected by the coronavirus outbreak include the Swiss Open in Basel next week, India Open, Malaysia Open and Singapore Open and a handful of smaller tournaments before the qualification cut-off mark closes on April 26.