Lin's contributions to badminton is similar to Bradman's in cricket
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With each passing year, regardless of whether he participates in international events or not, the fact that Lin Dan is the greatest badminton player ever is only becoming more and more apparent.His records speak for themselves and not just badminton, the whole world of sport has seldom come across a personality as enigmatic and intriguing as Lin.
If one were to merely glance at the compendium that is Lin's statistical fact-file, he or she would certainly be overawed. The magnitude of his achievements are such that one is sure to be left flabbergasted.
Comparisons cutting across lines of sport are seldom just and appropriate, but as far as Lin is concerned, the rules, one would wager, can be tilted to a great extent. Speaking, strictly from a statistical perspective, Lin's achievements can be held alongside those of Don Bradman's and Sachin Tendulkar's in cricket, Roger Federer's and Steffi Graf's in tennis and Toger Woods' in golf.
Lin, who is pushing 30, has won all the titles that professional badminton has to offer and whats more, he has won most of them multiple times. He has won the Olympic gold twice, the world championships a startling five times and the Thomas Cup five times.
That, despite being ranked 286 and making only his second appearance in a major tournament in 2013, he still managed to crush practically everyone en route to his fifth world championship title is testimony to his prowess.
Despite these accomplishments of almost super-human proportions, Lin's name is seldom spoken along with those of Federer, Bradman and the ilk. Is it because badminton is not as popular a sport as tennis? But, then, even in countries where the piece of willow that many Commonwealth countries know popularly as the cricket bat, Bradman's name is more or less common knowledge.
Even in 2010, an year in which Lin pulverised each and everyone of his opponents to make a clean sweep of the badminton titles that year, he was not awarded the Laureus award for the best sportsperson - male.
A slightly controversial athlete prone to throwing tantrums sporadically, Lin's charisma has only been enhanced by his imperfections. He is certainly not the embodiment or the personification of all that is good in sport but then, few in the world of sport today are.Those who have followed his rivalry with current world number one, Lee Chong Wei of Malaysia, have opined that Lin owes many of his successes to Lee's habit of choking at big events. The Malaysian is considered a huge underachiever but then, history remembers not those who could have changed the course of the world but those who did.Gaul remembers Vercingetorix but it is Gaius Julius Caesar that the whole world is much more familiar with.
In a sport where few players enjoy a purple patch longer than three to four years, Lin has been at the apex for nearly a decade and this alone merits a place for him alongside stalwarts such as Woods and Graf. It is high time the world of sport acknowledges Lin's glorious contributions.
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