Badminton is a sport that Indonesia has been able to do well on the international stage. Indonesia not only produces talented badminton athletes, but many eventually have careers as coaches abroad after retiring from international badminton, developing the sport they love in many parts of the world.
Badminton men’s doubles podium at the 2008 Summer Olympics. (Photo: BWF)
The data shows that the development of Indonesian badminton as a whole can be said to be good. Even though Indonesia had fasted a badminton gold medal at the 2012 London Olympics, Indonesia returned to the gold tradition at the 2016 Rio and the 2020 Toky Olympics.
Of the five existing disciplines, the best development came from the men’s doubles. The event has contributed the most titles to Indonesia in the BWF World Tour from 2018 until now.
In 2022 alone (until the 2022 Singapore Open), five of the eight BWF World Tour titles won by Indonesian shuttlers, or around 62.5%, came from the men’s doubles discipline.
In the last edition of the BWF World Championship that Indonesia participated in (2019 in Basel, Switzerland), the gold medal came from the men’s doubles. Even four Indonesian men’s doubles pairs managed to make all Indonesian semi-finals at the 2022 Singapore Open, meaning Indonesia locked the men’s doubles title.
Indonesia’s men’s doubles supremacy has been known for a long time. This can be proven by the 14th Indonesian Thomas Cup title, the most successful in the world. At the Olympics, although Indonesia has not won the men’s doubles since Beijing 2008, Indonesia is still the most successful country in the men’s doubles event, with three gold medals.