Momota Kento on 2022 struggles: "It's eating me up inside"

The BWF World Tour Finals 2022 in Guangzhou, China, is just around the corner and a familiar name will likely be missing - Momota Kento, the former men's world No. 1.

It’s been two months since the struggling two-time world champion had a summer he’d probably like to forget, in his home country, in front of his own fans.

In late August, Momota crashed out in the second round of the 2022 BWF World Championships in Tokyo. Just days later, he fell at the first hurdle of the Japan Open in Osaka.

Once the most dominant player on the tour, Momota kept a brave face in front of the cameras. Backstage, tears were shed - tears of disappointment, frustration, and confusion all rolled into one.

Momota has not competed since. As the year winds down, he has seen his world ranking slip to ninth and his World Tour ranking to 31st - outside the top eight necessary to qualify for the Tour Finals.

The season has been unkind to Momota, who once virtually lived at the top of the world ranking, holding the spot for more than three years from September 2018.

In 2022, he lost his first match five times and went out in the second round four times. He managed to reach the final of the Malaysia Open but was outclassed by Viktor Axelsen, who has unseated Momota at No. 1 and is currently head and shoulders above the rest of the competition.

For someone who swept to a record 11 titles in 2019, Momota’s fall from grace has been bewildering to say the least, to a point where he is drawing sympathy from those who watch him.

Momota clearly has not been the same since the fatal January 2020 highway accident in Kuala Lumpur in which he was nearly killed.

The 28-year-old did not even make it out of the group at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in 2021, and his most recent title dates back to November 2021, the Indonesia Masters.

Momota - who is still one of the most popular shuttlers on the tour - is not thinking about taking time off nor is he planning to change his defensive playing style, or work with a sports psychologist.

He seems determined to climb back to the summit the way he got there in the first place - through sheer grit and hard work.

“It’s definitely not fun not being able to win, especially when you’ve seen the view,” Momota said during an exclusive interview with Olympics.com recently.

“It’s not fun and it’s eating me up inside. But fortunately I still have the support of so many people and I feel like I can’t run.

"Having said that I haven’t had the results I want. It’s troubling for sure.

“I need to trust myself more, be confident. If I can just relax when I play, it’d make the game a lot easier for me. But when I step out on to the court, I tighten up.

“It’s something I have to change, somehow.”