DENMARK

Last weekend I attended an U13 tournament at the National Badminton Centre in Milton Keynes. The Danish U13 squad played England and comprehensively won 6-0.

Denmark has been the leading European badminton nation for as long as I can remember. During the event I just happened to stand next to one of Denmark’s elite coaches in charge of their U9, U11 and U13 squads. It seemed an ideal opportunity to try and find out how Denmark has been so successful in developing young talent.

First of all I asked about the standards for coaching in Denmark?
There are eight levels for badminton coaches. If you achieve level eight you can then study for as master’s qualification which takes 18 months to become an elite national coach. In England there are only three levels for badminton coaches.

Young badminton players from each region of Denmark are invited to train with one of their elite coaches. It is mandatory that the young players are accompanied by their regional coaches. This enables the elite coaches to train the young players but also their coaches.

Building a coordinated national coaching system across the whole of Denmark, where the most qualified coaches are passing on their knowledge and training techniques to the young players and their coaches.

Next I asked what Danish elite coaches look for in young badminton players.

There first priority is gymnastic ability. Can they walk on their hands? Perform back flips? Run in a straight line?

Training sessions concentrate of developing speed of movement. Very high intensity routines for say one minute, combined with longer stamina building routines lasting up to five minutes. One of the ideas behind this is to educate your mind and body to become familiar with performing at a high intensity, representative of the average length of rallies in badminton.

A typical two hour training session would devote 45 minutes on movement routines.

Development priority for young players in Denmark;

1. Gymnastic ability
2. Speed of movement
3. Racket skills

Movement is the key for young badminton players. Speed of footwork in particular.

Denmark’s results speak for themselves across Europe. They have a pool of approximately 300,000 players compared with England’s 970,000. They are very open to helping other European nations develop their young players and coaches to help Europe compete with Asian countries.

I wonder if Badminton England will be giving them a call?
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