English pullout unfortunate, no threat to World C'ship: BWF

Amit Kumar Das

Hyderabad, Aug 9 (PTI) Describing England's last-minute
pullout from the World Badminton Championship as unfortunate,
Badminton World Federation Sunday insisted that there is no
specific threat to the mega-event starting here Monday.

BWF Chief Operating Officer (COO) Thomas Lund said he
tried convincing the English team about the security situation
but it had already decided to pull out by then.

"There is no specific threat to championship from
anywhere. But of course the English team felt otherwise. It is
unfortunate but we should respect their decision," Lund told
reporters here.

"We had a discussion about the news but we didn't get the
chance to discuss and convince them about the development
because by the time we reached them, they had already decided
to withdraw," he revealed.

England Sunday pulled out of the event, citing specific
security threats from terror group Lashkar-e-Toiba. The team
will now have to pay USD 250,000 as withdrawal fee, which is
the general norm.

Lund said the English shuttlers could not be blamed for
the turn of events as they only acted on what was told to them
about a perceived terror threat.
"They had reached Hyderabad on Thursday night and next
morning they woke up to the news and it had a big influence on
them. Even I was a little worried because of such unconfirmed
news."

"We had intelligence information following a meeting with
the Cyberabad Police commissioner late Saturday which would
have been important in the assessment of the security of their
team," Lund added.

Asked if there were any other teams wanting to pull out,
Lund said, "No other team has approached us about any concerns
regarding the security and we have factual information which
shows the extensive levels of arrangement that has been made."

"Obviously, there still might be some concerns among the
players. So, we had a meeting with the team managers of
different countries and we have informed them about the
development," he added.

Commissioner of Police Prabhakar Reddy said all the
necessary arrangements have been put in place to ensure the
safety of players.

"The threat is just a perception but our preparedness is
water-tight and we are confident. There are some measures
which are visible and some which are invisible," he said.

"To make the player more comfortable we have made a lot
of arrangement that were not visible these days more apparent
so that their doubts, if any, can be pacified," he added. PTI
ATK
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