Thuy Linh's team has the reigning Olympic champion having a failed opening match.

In the opening match of the BDMNTN-XL badminton team tournament (abbreviated: BXL), Nguyen Thuy Linh and her teammates could not win.

Thuy Linh and team Lightning could not win the opening day of BXL - Photo: BXL

At BXL, Nguyen Thuy Linh is on team Lightning with reigning Olympic men's singles champion Viktor Axelsen and ajar players Alfian, Nur Izzudin Rumsani, Yuta Watanabe, Shevon Lai, Tse Ying Svet and Rutaparna Panda.

On the opening day on the evening of October 2, they faced the Blitzers team consisting of players Jonatan Christie, Michelle Li, Chirag Shetty, Ong Yew Sin, Sabar Gutama, Apriyani Rahayu, Lai Pei Jing and Misaki Matsutomo.

This is a special tournament, played in an unusual format. In the matches, each team competes in a format of two singles matches and two 3-on-3 matches. Each match lasts 8 minutes.

In the first 3v3 match, Team Lightning consisting of members Alfian, Rumsani and Shevon Lai won 3-2 against Gutama, Ong Yew Sin, Lai Pei Jing.

But in the second match, a singles match, Lightning lost the advantage. That was when Nguyen Thuy Linh took the field, but lost quite heavily 0-4 to Michelle Li.

Reigning Olympic champion Viktor Axelsen was powerless in the decisive match - Photo: BXL

In the third round, Olympic champion Viktor Axelsen took to the court to face Indonesia's No. 1 Jonatan Christie. Axelsen has a 100% winning record in the BXL, and he continued that trend by beating his opponent in a dramatic 3-2 victory.

But in the next 3-on-3 match, Lightning lost 1-3. This forced the two teams to play another singles match to determine the winner. That was when Axelsen met Christie again. But this time, Lightning lost 4-5, and his team and Thuy Linh had to lose in the end.

This defeat could prevent Team Lightning from winning the title, missing out on the chance to win the $350,000 prize. In that case, Vietnamese tennis player Nguyen Thuy Linh would also not be able to receive more than $40,000 (over 1 billion VND).

On October 3, the Lightning team will face the Hurricane team and must win to keep their hopes of winning the championship alive.

The BXL badminton tournament took place from October 2 to 5 in Jakarta (Indonesia). The total prize money was up to 750,000 USD (nearly 20 billion VND). Of which, the champion team received 350,000 USD (about 9.2 billion VND). This amount was divided equally among the team members.

DUC KHUE

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/doi-cua-thuy-linh-co-duong-kim-vo-dich-olympic-ra-quan-that-bai-20251003061545495.htm