Badminton success

By Aaryan Alexander | Posted: Thursday October 20, 2022

This year has been a big year for everyone, myself included.

Covid caused many uncertainties in sports and had previously cancelled a lot of tournaments.  So I decided to go and play as many tournaments in my final year of junior badminton, just in case Covid caused everything to stop. Again!

Here is a results recap from my year.

First up during the year were the regional tournaments. Usually in the South Island, there are 3 regional tournaments for the Under 19 age group. They are the Otago (held in Dunedin), Southland (held in Invercargill) and Canterbury (held in Christchurch) Under 19 championships. I entered these tournaments in all three badminton styles (singles, doubles and mixed doubles.) I triple-crowned in the Otago and Southland championships and double-crowned in the Canterbury championships. Triple crowning is when you win all 3 styles of badminton and double crowning is when you win 2 styles. I lost my mixed-doubles finals for the Canterbury champs and received a silver medal.

Next up was team nationals. These are held annually in Palmerston North during the July school holidays. I was selected to play as a part of the Mainland NZ A team. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend as I was ill with the flu which I had caught at the senior NZ nationals the weekend before.

During the term 3 holidays, the individual NZ Under 19 Nationals were held in Tauranga. Here I reached the semi-finals for singles and doubles. Right after nationals were the South Island Team and Individual championships. As a part of the Otago A team, I won South Islands and then continued through to the individual and won the singles event and the doubles event.

I also had the opportunity to play in lots of senior tournaments this year. I was selected for the senior Otago A badminton team and travelled quite a bit with the team to tournaments as well as individual tournaments.

Recently, I was named Otago Senior Player of the Year.

Apart from these main results mentioned above, I also won the doubles plate at the Auckland Under 19 championships, won the singles plate at the Wellington North open championships, and competed at Slazenger Cup (senior Div 2 nationals.)

In summary, this year I have played 104 games and out of those I won 75 matches and lost 29 matches.

I would like to thank everyone who has helped me throughout my badminton journey, both at school and out of school, especially my coaches Mr King and Mr Hoffman. I would also like to thank my teammates for always being supportive and finally, I would like to thank my family for always helping me achieve my best.

Image Gallery