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It has been a few years since I fell in love with playing badminton. Even though I have been playing for quite a while now and have improved my skills through the years, I have never participated in a formal badminton tournament, because I didn’t think I would have stood a chance against the highly-skilled players who competed regularly. However, in a twist of fate, an unforeseen chance to compete was given to me and the result was totally unexpected.
I recently became a member of the local badminton club. As a new member, I didn’t know that the club had an annual doubles tournament. Since I didn’t sign up, I knew I probably couldn’t play but I wanted to watch the tournament anyways, so I went to the gym as usual. Once I was there, I found out that one of players who signed up was unable to compete, and after some deliberations, the club officials allowed me to take the player’s place in the tournament. I was a little nervous but then I thought that this was good chance to gain some valuable experience, so no matter win or lose, I would get something good out of playing in the tournament.
According to the tournament rules, the 24 participants are split into three groups and each player must pair up with four different partners and play four doubles games within the group. After the four games, the four players with the best records out of the three groups will play a final game to determine the champions, so in order to win the tournament, I must win 5 games. Due to some luck and maybe the fact that the other players weren’t familiar with my style, I easily dispatched my opponents in the first four games. In the finals however, my partner and I have met our match. The game was very hard fought but our opponents managed to get an 8 to 4 lead before changing sides, and then they extended the margin, leading 12 to 7. At that point, my partner and I knew we had to do something quick in order to make a comeback, so we changed our playing strategy. That seemed to work and we managed to even the game up at 13 a piece, and then we got the 14 to 13 lead. In the last play of the game, I jumped up looking like I was going to do a power smash but instead I made a drop shot to the front of the net. My opponents were caught unaware and couldn’t return the shot, giving us the winning point. When the tournament organizer handed me the first place trophy, I was still amazed by the experience and the fact that I won. Of course, I also had the feeling of joy, as I just won my first badminton trophy.
