Ratchanok to defend world title as Asia's Sporting Icon
Thai No 1 shuttler Ratchanok Intanon was handed a confidence boost ahead of her world title defence next month when she received the inaugural Fox Sports Asian Sporting Icon Award at a hotel in Bangkok yesterday.
Ratchanok, who upset world No 1 Li Xuerui at the BWF World Championships in Guangzhou last August for the coveted title, was named Asian Sporting Icon after four weeks of online voting at www.FoxSportsAsia.com/ASIA.
The youngest world champion at 18, Ratchanok has set her sights on retaining her crown in Denmark at the end of August but is expecting stiff competition from the Chinese.
“It will be very tough this time, especially against the top Chinese players. Their standard has been very high, so it won’t be easy. But I will give everything to defend my title,” said world No 6 Ratchanok, speaking after the award ceremony at Bangkok’s Oriental Residence Hotel. Ratchanok beat 15 other Asian athletes short-listed by a panel of Fox Sports journalists.
A total of 566,855 votes were cast over four rounds of voting in December and January, with Ratchanok receiving over 55 per cent in the final round to top the poll ahead of Indonesian badminton duo Hendra Setiawan and Mohd Ahsan, on 44 per cent.
Voters were lured with the chance to win a top prize of an all-expenses-paid trip to watch this year’s French Open tennis tournament at Roland Garros, while 22 others won either an iPad Mini or a Nike+ Sportswatch GPS.
Elsewhere, in Sydney, Chinese superstar Lin Dan fought back from a game down to overhaul Simon Santoso and win the World Superseries Australian Badminton Open.
The two-time Olympic gold medallist and five-time world champion downed the 18th-ranked Indonesian, 22-24 21-16 21-7 in 75 minutes.
It was Lin’s first World Superseries final in over two years.
India’s Saina Nehwal won the women’s singles final in straight games against Spain’s Carolina Marin. The eighth-ranked Nehwal overcame early resistance to defeat Marin, ranked three places below her, 21-18 21-11 in 43 minutes.
It was Nehwal’s first World Superseries final in 20 months and she got there by eliminating Chinese top seed Wang Shixian in the semis.
