A badminton bubble? BWF looking into staging tournaments at single venue

If both the Super 1000 events and the World Tour Finals take place successfully, the world body will most likely adopt a similar format for the 2020 Olympic qualifiers by staging several tournaments in one location.

"The challenges are not as big if you do not have to cross so many national borders. In our structure, we have 300 to 400 players coming from 40 to 60 countries. The challenge is we need them getting out of their countries, and getting into host countries with different quarantine restrictions," said BWF secretary-general Thomas Lund.

He added the BWF are trying to create a cluster in Thailand where several tournaments can be played at one go.

India’s chief coach P.Gopichand had suggested this idea way back in May, when the pandemic was spreading rampantly and all sporting events across the globe came to an abrupt halt.

"I would say that planning of tournaments has to be such that players can actually stay at one place and play more number of tournaments. It could be the next normal," he said back then.

As of now, only the Denmark Open, taking place from October 13th to 18th, is slated to take place.

The tournament is eagerly awaited by players and fans across the globe, especially with some of the biggest stars like Kento Momota, Saina Nehwal, Carolina Marin and Anders Antonsen having confirmed their participation.

The standard operating procedures of this event could also set a precedent for tournaments to come, so the BWF will be eager to tick all the right boxes by working with the Danish BA and their government.

This year, only five tournaments took place before the pandemic ravaged the world.

It kicked off with the Malaysia Masters, followed by the Indonesia, Thailand and Spain Masters. The All-England in March was the final event staged before lockdown.