My Badminton Musings...
First off, some history behind why I started playing badminton in the first place. Bear with me, peeps! =P
I think it was the during the Thomas Cup of 1996 that I first got interested in the game of badminton. It was the craze during that time especially encroaching upon the final stages of the Thomas Cup.
Everyone would be playing badminton! My neighbourhood was full of young children playing badminton using their gates as the fence, some playing in the open field and even some particularly brave ones playing in the middle of the road!
Anyway, I got together with a group of friends from secondary school with the same interest and we began to play around once a week at the local neighbourhood badminton court. It was an open air court so we could only play when the weather was good and it wasn't raining but it was free, so nobody complained.
Also, it didn't have a badminton net, so we pooled together some money to purchase a net and we took turns bringing the net to the court everytime we decided to play. This was during my secondary school days. I remember we had lots fun trying out new kinds of shots and swings based on what we saw from the badminton matches featured on the television.
My dad did play his part to encourage me to take up the sport as he too was a frequent badminton player and still plays to this day. He was the one that bought me my first racquet and occasionally brought me along to his sessions where I could see better players in action.
Most of time, I would be practising my badminton shots with the wall as nobody could spare the time to play with me =(
When I was in Form 5 seconday school, my parents decided to send me to a professional coach, a former Thomas Cup player apparently. It was during these weekly sessions that I honed my badminton skills. However, my classes were shortlived as SPM was heading close and I had to stop after 6 months of badminton tutelage.
After moving on to college, our weekly badminton sessions with my secondary school friends began to become less and less frequent. As we were all attending different colleges, meeting up for a badminton match became harder and harder and in the end we stopped playing altogether.
It would be only 6 years later that I would resume playing badminton with the same group of friends...
Due to work commitments, some of my friends were posted overseas; myself included. Hence, we were unable to resume our badminton sessions. Only in 2005, did everyone make the effort to get together to have some semblance of our former badminton sessions. Even then, we were all so busy and had other commitments.
I was forced to be satisfied with a badminton session once every 1-2 months. Needless to say, after such a long badminton drought, my skills had dropped considerably and I was deeply frustrated at this.
I knew that this few and far between badminton sessions will continue to be the norm as no one was willing to make a strong effort to get everybody together. Hence, when my dad early this year that his badminton group was looking for players, I jumped at the chance however I was in for a few surprises...
First off, his group consisted mostly of older men in their 40's. They have mostly been playing for at least 10-20 years and thus needless to say, are much more experienced than myself. My first match with them ended up in a horrifying defeat.
Mentally, I was not prepared to an opponent that possessed skills far greater than my own. Thus, I was making silly mistakes most of the time and did not perform to the best of my potential. But that was not the biggest problem...
After the first session, I noticed that my Dad had began dispensing his advice to make me a 'better' player. Not that I dont appreciate it but I felt very frustrated that I wasn't able to understand how to apply his advice to my playing style and he kept criticizing me over and over again.
Of course, after a few more sessions, I improved considerably and thankfully, my Dad commented less and less on my playing style to which I was very grateful. But there were still other things that were bothering me about the badminton group.
Top most on my list of worries were the simple fact that I was still not as good as the majority of the group. Because of that, everytime I played a game, I got the feeling that the rest of the players were just humouring me and not playing their normal game. Also, because of this, I spent alot of time watching the others play from the sidelines.
Perhaps at some point, I felt embarassed that I could not play at the same level as them. It was only when they were satisfied after playing a few games amongt themselves would they invite me to play with them. This infuriated me to no end but I realized that this was the only way I could improve my game.
At least, they were still giving me a chance to play with them and learn from them where as I wouldn't be entertained at all in other groups. So in the end, I ended up playing less games than I normally did when I play with my friends but at least I found each game very challenging and satisfying.
Looks like I will have to be content with this arrangement until I manage to improve my game to be on par with the group....
I think it was the during the Thomas Cup of 1996 that I first got interested in the game of badminton. It was the craze during that time especially encroaching upon the final stages of the Thomas Cup.
Everyone would be playing badminton! My neighbourhood was full of young children playing badminton using their gates as the fence, some playing in the open field and even some particularly brave ones playing in the middle of the road!
Anyway, I got together with a group of friends from secondary school with the same interest and we began to play around once a week at the local neighbourhood badminton court. It was an open air court so we could only play when the weather was good and it wasn't raining but it was free, so nobody complained.
Also, it didn't have a badminton net, so we pooled together some money to purchase a net and we took turns bringing the net to the court everytime we decided to play. This was during my secondary school days. I remember we had lots fun trying out new kinds of shots and swings based on what we saw from the badminton matches featured on the television.
My dad did play his part to encourage me to take up the sport as he too was a frequent badminton player and still plays to this day. He was the one that bought me my first racquet and occasionally brought me along to his sessions where I could see better players in action.
Most of time, I would be practising my badminton shots with the wall as nobody could spare the time to play with me =(
When I was in Form 5 seconday school, my parents decided to send me to a professional coach, a former Thomas Cup player apparently. It was during these weekly sessions that I honed my badminton skills. However, my classes were shortlived as SPM was heading close and I had to stop after 6 months of badminton tutelage.
After moving on to college, our weekly badminton sessions with my secondary school friends began to become less and less frequent. As we were all attending different colleges, meeting up for a badminton match became harder and harder and in the end we stopped playing altogether.
It would be only 6 years later that I would resume playing badminton with the same group of friends...
Due to work commitments, some of my friends were posted overseas; myself included. Hence, we were unable to resume our badminton sessions. Only in 2005, did everyone make the effort to get together to have some semblance of our former badminton sessions. Even then, we were all so busy and had other commitments.
I was forced to be satisfied with a badminton session once every 1-2 months. Needless to say, after such a long badminton drought, my skills had dropped considerably and I was deeply frustrated at this.
I knew that this few and far between badminton sessions will continue to be the norm as no one was willing to make a strong effort to get everybody together. Hence, when my dad early this year that his badminton group was looking for players, I jumped at the chance however I was in for a few surprises...
First off, his group consisted mostly of older men in their 40's. They have mostly been playing for at least 10-20 years and thus needless to say, are much more experienced than myself. My first match with them ended up in a horrifying defeat.
Mentally, I was not prepared to an opponent that possessed skills far greater than my own. Thus, I was making silly mistakes most of the time and did not perform to the best of my potential. But that was not the biggest problem...
After the first session, I noticed that my Dad had began dispensing his advice to make me a 'better' player. Not that I dont appreciate it but I felt very frustrated that I wasn't able to understand how to apply his advice to my playing style and he kept criticizing me over and over again.
Of course, after a few more sessions, I improved considerably and thankfully, my Dad commented less and less on my playing style to which I was very grateful. But there were still other things that were bothering me about the badminton group.
Top most on my list of worries were the simple fact that I was still not as good as the majority of the group. Because of that, everytime I played a game, I got the feeling that the rest of the players were just humouring me and not playing their normal game. Also, because of this, I spent alot of time watching the others play from the sidelines.
Perhaps at some point, I felt embarassed that I could not play at the same level as them. It was only when they were satisfied after playing a few games amongt themselves would they invite me to play with them. This infuriated me to no end but I realized that this was the only way I could improve my game.
At least, they were still giving me a chance to play with them and learn from them where as I wouldn't be entertained at all in other groups. So in the end, I ended up playing less games than I normally did when I play with my friends but at least I found each game very challenging and satisfying.
Looks like I will have to be content with this arrangement until I manage to improve my game to be on par with the group....
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