Brilliant. It's surprising how we haven't seen any coverage about a pair this dominant before (arguably GOAT-level by a mile). Thank you Ben for doing outstanding work and telling this story. We badminton fans truly appreciate it.
Ben's background as a top flight player himself lends great insight and perspective to these videos as well as knowledge (both personal and professional). It's so easy for these amazing players of the past to be memory holed into history and we can grow to forget the astounding qualities they brought to the sport. Badminton, for a sport which such a long history, has a relatively short Olympic story as it only became a "demonstration sport" at the 1972 event before being adopted as a full Olympic sport from 1992 Barcelona forward. All comfortably within my lifetime, which serves only to demonstrate how monumentally old I am!
Bravo! Thank you Ben for this wonderful documentary, it's so well structured and interesting. I can't imagine how many hours you dedicated to this, how many matches you had to watch, Salute! Those are blood boiling jaw dropping stats! I thought Chen QingChen and Jia Yifan almost good enough to be the GOAT, now I realize it's impossible. And Chen and Jia also have different personalities as Ge and Gu, they said they wouldn't be friends if not for badminton, interesting!
Ge Fei & Gu Jun were part of youngsters that help to revive China’s glory. From 1992 they suffered sharp declines in men’s singles, women’s singles, men’s doubles, a little bit less in women’s doubles. The 1995 Sudirman Cup observed Chinese young guns shocked the world by defeating top players and won the 1st title for their country. Sun Jun (19) & Ye Zhaoying (21) then started to conquer the world as Ge Fei (19) and Gu Jun (20) began their domination.
They have a solid system with good funding, and excellent coaches. With years of excellence it means they have not only a wealth of knowledge but can attract the best athletes to the sport. Success breeds success as they say, China is a shining example of that
China has previously dominated WD for years. They have so many pairs in Top 5. Some players play like men. Now WD is slightly more open. FanChen seem to dominate today too.
Fun fact: at the early 1996, the pair was on the verge of breaking up, as Ge Fei, an introvert, felt so annoyed by Gu Jun, who was so straightforward, was picking up on everything she did. Coach Tian Bingyi, not Li Yongbo, was the one who solved this problem. He talked to each of them personally, then together, and the girls were deeply touched. They started to understand each other more, and that I believe had marked the start of their domination.
Interesting. In the two articles I read with exerts from their interview Tian Bingyi wasn't mentioned (Li Yongbo was as to was "coach" maybe that was Tian) and there wasn't a mention of their arguments almost causing them to almost split. Thanks for the fun fact 😊
@@BenBeckmanBadminton It was mentioned a lot in Chinese newspaper. Here's from an article I read on Sohu: "...In life, Ge Fei is introverted and not good at speaking, while Gu Jun is lively and outgoing and talks a lot. Because of the big contrast in personality, the two are a perfect match on the court, but they rarely interact in life. Apart from training and competitions, Ge Fei and Gu Jun rarely played together, they did not live in the same dormitory, and neither had ever invited the other to dinner. Girls are more sensitive, and Ge Fei and Gu Jun would have some small conflicts during training. Before the 1996 All England Open Badminton Championships, Ge Fei found Tian Bingyi and said that Gu Jun liked to nag and she couldn't stand it, so she asked to break up. Tian Bingyi tried to persuade Ge Fei: Gu Jun is a straightforward person, don't take it to heart, she just wants to play well because she likes to nag. You and Ge Fei are the key players of the team, and she has paid a lot for you in every aspect, how can you just break up? Afterwards, Tian Bingyi also worked on Gu Jun: Ge Fei has a different personality from you, so you should pay attention to the way you speak in the future. Then, Tian Bingyi called Ge Fei and Gu Jun together and gave them a metaphor: A pair of excellent doubles players should have three legs, one of which is tied together, so that they can cooperate well. Now that you two have the strength to win the Olympic championship, you must cherish the opportunity to win glory for the country. How many chances can you have in life? Ge Fei and Gu Jun were deeply touched, and they never had any quarrels again after that. Whenever they had any ideas, they would bring them up in time for discussion..." Also, Tian Bingyi was the WD head coach at the time. So he would have to deal with such problems more directly than Li Yongbo.
@@lucashamilton151 so interesting. Finding Chinese articles and all that stuff is tricky for me. I'll do even more digging next time. Appreciate you making the comment... Super cool n interesting
@@BenBeckmanBadminton I strongly recommend that. There are so many touching stories that you would not regret reading. Especially for the question “How did they do it?” at the end of the video. So much more than just the rivalry.
Amazing video. I feel like women doubles in the least spoken about discipline in Badminton ( I might be wrong). So its so nice to see content creators like you make such well researched videos about it.
You aren't wrong, women's doubles is the least talked about discipline in badminton. I'll always try to do videos on all of badminton, from all disciplines to players of all levels. Whatever I find interesting or tells a good story will make it into my channel 😀
Because the Chinese dominated the field all the time. It got more attention during Matsutomo/Takahashi’s era but then Chen/Jia returned to “invincible” mode. Now Baek/Lee is becoming the biggest threat, but who knows how long.
