4-time Olympian joins qualifiers for Paris Games

Guatemala’s Kevin Cordon returns to Indonesia’s Anthony Ginting during their bronze medal match at the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.(SHI TANG/BADMINTONPHOTO)

Four-time Olympian Kevin Cordon of Guatemala is among the 199 players from 25 countries registered to play in the Northern Marianas Open 2023, which would kick off the double-header 2024 Paris Olympics qualifiers that the NMI will be hosting next month.

Joining Cordon in the Northern Marianas Open scheduled for June 6-11 at the Gilbert C. Ada Gymnasium are the NMI’s Nate Guerrero, Leonard Manuel, Daniel Macario, Paolo Quidato, Ian and Brian Lubao, Daniel Pablo, and Janelle Pangilinan.

Cordon is the top seed in the men’s singles draw and will be vying for qualifying points that would help him play in the Olympic Games for the fifth straight time. The 36-yeard-old and world No. 40 player first saw action in the Beijing Olympics in 2008 and was Guatemala’s flag bearer. Cordon then competed at London 2012 and Brazil 2016, while his latest and most impressive one was at the 2020 Tokyo Games in 2022.  He was the first Central American to reach the Olympic badminton semis when he defeated South Korea’s Kwang-Hee to arrange a duel with eventual gold medalist Viktor Axelsen of Denmark.

As for the host country, Pangilinan, Guerrero, Manuel, and Macario were members of the NMI Team that played in the 2022 Northern Marianas Pacific Mini Games. Manuel, Guerrero, and Pangilinan also joined a tournament in New Zealand early this year, while junior players Quidato, Ian and Brian Lubao, and Pablo will have their first taste of high-level competition.

“We are excited to welcome the participants of the two 2024 Paris Olympic Qualifiers and I believe with an Olympian on the men’s singles list and a bunch of very competitive players from Chinese-Taipei, Japan, Korea, and other Asian countries where badminton is very popular, we can expect very good games,” said Merlie Tolentino, president of the Northern Marianas Badminton Association, which was awarded the hosting rights for the Olympic qualifier.

“We are also looking forward to our own players having the chance to experience competing at this level. We’re calling our community members to support our players and also show our warm island hospitality to our visiting players and officials, who will be on Saipan for two weeks,” Tolentino added.

Other notable players in the competition are men’s singles No. 2 seed Chi Yu Jen of Chinese-Taipei; men’s doubles No. 2 seed Nyl Yakura and Adam Dong of Canada; women’s singles No. 2 seed Sung Shuo Yu of Chinese-Taipei; mixed doubles No. 2 seed Adahm Hatem Elagamel and Doha Hany of Egypt; and VICTOR Oceania Championships and mixed doubles winners Kenneth Choo and Gronya Sommerville of Australia.

After the Northern Marianas Open 2023, the majority of the players entered in this competition will remain on island to participate in the Saipan International 2023, which will run from June 13 to 18. The second part of the Olympic qualifier double-header has drawn 204 players. Guam, Spain, Hungary, Belgium, Malaysia, Singapore, India, New Zealand, Vietnam, Mongolia, Thailand, Finland, Poland, Slovakia, and Germany are the other countries represented in the Northern Marianas Open 2023 and Saipan International 2023.

The two NMI-hosted 2024 Paris Olympic qualifiers are both Grade 3 events (Continental Level) that are sanctioned by the Badminton World Federation and Badminton Oceania. (PR)