The 20-year-old Canadian Victor Lai has made a name for himself in the badminton world this week by reaching the semi-final of the world championships presented in France. Her journey stopped in three rounds against the world number 1, Shi Yu Qi on Saturday.
After easily won the first round 21-13, Lai went to a hair to materialize the exceptional. In advance 20-18, with two match balls in hand, he sent the wheel just outside the bottom line. The video recovery confirmed that the sparrow was released, by just a few millimeters.
Victor Lai also passed near a place in the final of the world championships at the Adidas arena in Paris.
Photo : Courtoisie / Badminton World Championships
His Chinese opponent then chained the following two points to win 22-20 and impose the holding of a third commitment, also pocketed 21-16.
Lai thus obtains a bronze medal, since the format of this tournament automatically grants a 3rd place to the two losing semi-finalists.
An almost unexpected result for this player who was in the first participation in world championships. We saw him coming a bit from the junior side, but never at this level
mentions the analyst for Radio-Canada Sports Philippe Bourret. In recent years, we have been talking more about Brian Yang, who had qualified for the Olympic Games. Victor Lai comes out of nowhere, his explosion is a real surprise. We saw it a little on the Pan American circuit, but this type of performance against the world elite, no one had seen it coming.
It was a very high quality match, which lasted almost 1 hour 20 minutes, that means long and quality exchanges. For Victor, it is an incredible experience, when you think that no one imagined going to go so far, probably not even.
Before rubbing the world number 1, Lai also defeated the Singaporean Loh Kean Yew (9th) in the quarterfinals and the Chinese read Guang Zu (11th) in the 2nd round.
Even the world number 1 had to fight to win, and he is a player who has dominated on the international scene for a year. This performance will allow us to rise in the world ranking. He was 50th, he will climb into the top 30
explains Philippe Bourret, who represented Canada at the Athens Olympic Games in 2004.
Le Torontois Victor Lai
Photo : Reuters / Stephanie Lecocq
Lai, who is a Kinesiology student at York University, will resume lessons next week. He will now have important decisions to make
according to Philippe Bourret. This is always the big question in badminton in Canada. If he wants to go to the next level, he will have to spend more time to his sports career. Others like Brian Yang and Michelle Li made the choice to expatriate for several months to get closer to international competitions. This is not an easy decision.
In an interview with the Olympics.com site after his victory in the quarterfinals on Friday, Victor Lai already confided that his performances this week would encourage him to think about his future. School can always take a break. I am there part-time already, so I will see how the conciliation will happen,
he said.
