Taufik Hidayat showed on Saturday why he doesn’t merely make magical moments his own. Badminton’s biggest enthraller etched every frame of his strokes on a hundred-odd minds at the Gachibowli Stadium.
At one point, Hidayat, moving forward to the net, watched the lobbed shuttle looping down behind him, twirled around on his heel without a hint of imbalance, and used his backhand to flick it back exactly where it had come from. There’s a respectably short summation: the reverse backhand slice. But it was a shuttle, which anyone — even a disinterested Hidayat on one of his moody days — would’ve given up on. The match stats would reduce the moment to a shuttle picked in vain as the long rally finally ended in favour of Hidayat’s compatriot Tommy Sugiarto. But it was a rare point won by the youngster in Hidayat’s 36-minute 21-13 21-11 march into the final.
At game point in the opener, the 28-year-old world No 7 had stamped his dominance on the match with a rasping backhand cross-court smash. Another shot was hit from behind and between his legs, and yet another was a push at the net, almost as an afterthought and with a theatric pause, which whizzed right past Sugiarto’s nose. The most dramatic was another attack: Hidayat expected a high shuttle on his far right, found it to his left, and turned around for a backhand smash.