The 2016 Badminton Asia Championships in Wuhan will be the final big tournament, as it has been upgraded to Superseries status since last year, counting toward the Olympics qualification period. And a few players and doubles pairs are holding onto the final piece of hope in Wuhan. Korea’s Lee Dong Keun is now at no.18 in the BWF’s
Race to Rio. He will need to win at least one round here, up against India’s Kidambi Srikanth, for a chance to reach the top-16 mark and receive a second singles spot for Korea, after
Son Wan Ho.
The only other scenario for Lee to qualify for Rio would be
Ko Sung Hyun qualifying for the men’s doubles with
Shin Baek Choel, so Korea will earn an additional “quota place”. Ko and Shin are still about 2,000 points shy of teammates
Kim Gi Jung/Kim Sa Rang in a battle for Korea’s second doubles quota.