Putting the 'bad' in badminton: The mind games top shuttlers play
Loh Kean Yew wants to be the bad guy.
Not the physical kind who smashes racquets or fires shuttles directly at an opponent, but the kind who can throw opponents off with some cleverly crafted mind games.
“I should definitely learn and try to master this skill even more,” the 2021 world champion told Olympics.com. “It's not a good thing for me to be nice. There were quite a lot of times that I tried to be nice and it definitely backfired, and that's not very good, but I've been trying to be not as nice. It's tough, but I'm trying to not be nice.”
Badminton may have started out as a 'gentleman’s sport', but the swagger some players bring to the court nowadays shows that things have evolved in quite dramatic ways.
Some players regularly use mind games, such as delaying the game or yelling loudly across the net, to gain an edge. And now more are trying to toughen up their own playing style.
“It's a skill to be able to do that,” said Indian doubles player Ashwini Ponnappa. “To be able to annoy your opponent is definitely talent because you don't go onto the court with an intention to irritate your opponent. The ones who do know exactly what they're doing, so it's definitely talent.”
Olympics.com spoke to top badminton players to see how opponents manage to mess with their minds, how they respond to the challenge and why it pays off to be 'bad' on the court.
Being "nice" has not always worked out for Loh Kean Yew who would like to introduce more mind games into his play
Mind games 101: Dissecting the tactics
USA’s mixed doubles pair Allison Lee and Presley Smith experienced the damaging effects of mind games first-hand when they faced India’s husband-and-wife duo, B. Sumeeth and Sikki Reddy, in the Round of 16 at the BWF Madrid Spain Masters 2024.
The Indians took a tight opener 22-20. Returning to the court for the second game, they showed the same physical finesse but with even more emotions mixed in.
The Reddys yelled, "Come on, come on," to each other, or to their opponents, and “Going, going, going,” in reference to their partner who could be moving or not moving across the court. The pair also took their time to get ready and celebrated points loudly.
“They're pretty experienced, so they can play a lot of mind games and it really got to me,” a dejected Lee told Olympics.com afterwards. “It's a huge thing. I think more experienced players know exactly what to do in these situations.”
B. Sumeeth Reddy explained later that these actions were not intended to throw off their opponents, but rather to help his team navigate on the court where they faced tricky, fast conditions. At the same time, he conceded that their confusing shouting may have contributed to their victory.
“That's just to communicate with each other, but I think in a way it's actually troubling the opponents as well because they were like, 'What are these people saying?'” he said. “They started thinking, 'What else should I do?' and then started making some mistakes. I think that helped us.”
Danish men’s doubles players, 21-year-old William Kryger Boe and 19-year-old Christian Faust Kjær, have also been on the receiving end of less-than-sporting behaviour while facing more senior opponents.
“When you receive, you can hold the hand up for quite a bit and then the server is maybe getting nervous and you can shout at each other,” Boe said of how the mind games work, before summing up: “There are some bad guys.”
While the Danish pair pride themselves on being able to “stay calm and be cool” in the face of such challenges, they also admitted that aggressive shouting can throw them off their game.
“You lose your focus and you're scared to play the difficult shots sometimes,” Kjær said. “When someone is shouting at you, you feel like, 'Oh, he's much bigger and stronger than me,' and I'm this small, small child.”
The mind games could be the deciding factor in matches between top-level opponents who are evenly matched in terms of their physical skills.
“There are a lot of opponents who do that,” Ponnappa said. “They take time or they yell or they stop you from serving. That's definitely a game of mind because you know that they're trying to break your rhythm on court, but it is an important part of the sport.
"It depends on how strong you are, to make sure to not get affected by it. But in the heat of the moment, sometimes you do get affected by it, so the players who do that do get an advantage.”
Ashwini Ponnappa
An eye for an eye: How badminton players respond to mind games
Once the challenge of the mind game is served, it is up to the players to respond.
Many try to block out the noise and stick to their original plan.
“If she screams, I think, 'OK.' But for me I just focus on how I want to play,” says Thailand’s 2013 world champion Ratchanok Intanon about answering the challenge of her women’s singles opponents.
Loh studies his opponents in advance to know what to expect and respond accordingly.
“They make a scene during play. They take longer time for the break or keep taking long pauses, or don't let you change the shuttle because it's going their way,” he said. “I just try to adapt the best that I can. Some people have some habits so, with some of them, you know beforehand that they're going to do this kind of thing.”
Sometimes, however, players opt for a more aggressive reply to their on-court rivals.
“I think it's important. It's part of the game, so it's better to know how to deal with that and to do it sometimes,” said French player Delphine Delrue. “We try, but not every match. It depends if we are good or not on court. So a bit less good, we try to play with this part of the game.”
“We try to break as much as possible the rhythm, the momentum,” her mixed doubles partner Thom Gicquel elaborated. “Sometimes when you lose two or three points in a row, you want to change the shuttle even if it's a good one.”
Denmark’s Boe and Kjær, who tend to be calm and quiet on the court, said they also find it hard to avoid being provoked.
“We get a bit irritated sometimes when they shout too much and then we also shout,” Kjær said. “It goes both ways.”
He noted, however, that they are careful to use the mind tactics sparingly.
“It can be a good thing, but I think also it can be kind of a hindrance,” Kjær explained. “Sometimes you get a bit too aggressive on court and make some errors.”
While Ratchanok Intanon describes herself as a "quiet person", she said she sometimes screams to gain an edge over an opponent
Learning to be the "bad guy"
While London 2012 and Rio 2016 Olympian Ashwini Ponnappa admires the mind tactics her opponents dish out, she rarely deploys them herself.
“I don't think it comes naturally,” she said. “Either it comes naturally to a player or it doesn't.”
A certain swagger and personality are required to pull it off, and not all players feel comfortable assuming such a persona.
Softly-spoken Intanon is a player whose personality seems to be at odds with mind games. And the 29-year-old Thai has to make a conscious effort to tap into those tactics when she is looking to spice up her game.
“I'm a quiet person. Sometimes if I'm not very good, I just scream out, but not always,” Intanon said. “I try to push myself more from deep inside.”
Chinese Taipei’s Chou Tien Chen said he understands why other badminton players use mind games, but he made a pledge early to avoid such tactics altogether.
“Everyone wants to win, so they want to use everything they can. I can understand, but when I was young, playing badminton, I promised I wouldn't do this,” Chou said. “Sometimes I'm confused. It's a gentle sport. We don't need to be yelling face to face.”
While Loh made no such pledge, he has noticed his swagger dim naturally over the years.
“I know that I did it when I was younger. But as I grow older, I tend to be nicer in a sense, but that's not really helping in a game because that shouldn't be how it's split,” Loh said, before adding with a laugh: “I need to bring back my old mastermind!”
There are mixed feelings about the 'bad guys' of badminton. Some players admire them, some dislike them, and that goes for the fans as well.
For Loh, however, it all comes down to who can win the final match.
“Some fans love it. Some fans don't love it. Some of them think that it's not sportsmanship. Some of them think it's entertaining,” Singapore's star athlete said. “But ultimately people in the end still see only the result. Throughout history you only remember who wins gold and who wins silver and the result. You don't remember them for being nice.”