The International Badminton Federation (IBF) announced Saturday its qualifiers for the 2004 Olympic Games badminton tournament in Athens as the exhausting year-long Olympic qualifying has come to an end.

The qualified players have been taken from the May 1 world ranking list, and in filling IBF's quota of 172 players at the Games, a total of 30 National Olympic Committees currently have players qualified to play in Athens. China are the most represented NOC with 13 entries across the five disciplines.

Chinese players scooped four out of five gold medals at the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games, and have their maximum quota of three entries in both the singles and women's doubles, and also two entries in the men's and mixed doubles.

Thanks to an impressive semi-finals run at the Asian Championships men's singles last week, South Korea's Park Tae Sanghas earned himself an 11th hour reprieve and joins teammates Lee Hyun Il and Shon Seung Mo on the list of qualifiers.

Malaysia is the only other nation, besides China and South Korea, which has the maximum three qualifiers in men's singles, through Wong Choong Hann, Roslin Hashim and Lee Chong Wei.

There will be further celebrations in the Malaysian camp, though, not only have former world bronze medallists Chan Chong Ming and Chew Choon Eng made the cut in men's doubles, but they also have a women's doubles pairing, Commonwealth gold medallists Wong Pei Tty a and Chin Eei Hui, qualified for the Olympics for the very first time.

Canadian Denyse Julien and Bulgarian Neli Boteva feature in the list of qualifiers meaning that, if selected by their NOCs, they will have played at four Olympic Games, every one since badminton was first introduced to the Olympic program in 1992.

Against joy for some, there's the inevitable heartbreak for others, including Denmark's Anders Boesen. With teammates Peter Gade and Kenneth Jonassen ahead of him in the men's singles ranking, the 28-year-old needed to stay in the top 16, where he's remained consistently for the past 18 months, for Denmark to be able to take all three players. Not even his bronze medal at the European Championships was enough to see him hold on, and he slips to 18th this week and sees his Olympic dreams over.

It's a similar story for Sydney mixed doubles bronze medallist Simon Archer as his quarter-finals placing with Donna Kellogg at the European Championships proved not enough. With two British pairs already in the top 16, Archer and Kellogg needed to join them in the top 16 to earn a ticket to Athens, but they fall short in this all-important ranking list, and find themselves in 20th position.

There some consolation for Kellogg, however, as she's made the cut in women's doubles with Gail Emms.

National Olympic Committees now have until May 31 to confirm if players will be selected to represent their country, after which time IBF will re-allocate unused qualification places until the final entry deadline of July 21.
 
(Xinhua News Agency May 2, 2004)