Three seeds for Canty

Press, 26 August 1978, Page 10

Three seeds for Canty

By

DAVID LEGGAT

Canterbury has three players seeded in the men’s and women’s open

singles at the national badminton championships which begin in Dunedin » on Monday. Peter Whiting is eighth seed in the men’s competition while Alison Ross and Dianne Erikson, who is in splendid form at present, are seeded fifth and eighth respectively in the women’s singles. The most notable omission in the men’s singles is the veteran, Richard Purser. Now approaching 37, Purser seems content to concentrate solely on doubles play. This is unfortunate in the light of his effort at the Edmonton Commonwealth Games,

when he reached the quar-ter-finals of the men’s singles. He is still one of the country’s top singles players and as such should not completely abandon singles play. Ross Livingston, Bryan Purser and Steve Wilson, all Edmonton representatives, fill the top three positions. Livingston, a powerful left-hander, will be seeking to retain the title he won last year at Wanganui, thereby denying Richard Purser a record tenth national singles title. Livingston and his wife, Mary, second seed in the women’s singles, both won two titles at last year’s championships. Bryan Purser, aged 27, has spent much of the last few years overseas and his showing will be of considerable interest, while Wilson is developing into the country’s most promising player. The placing of Alison Branfield ahead of Mrs

Livingston in the women’s singles is mildly surprising. Mrs Livingston beat her in straight sets in last year’s final and Mrs Livingston has evidently been playing impressively” in recent weeks. Although none of the women got past the third round of the singles at the Commonwealth Games, Mrs Branfield narrowly missed a bronze medal in the mixed doubles when she and Richard Purser were beaten in the semifinals by Mike Tredgett and Nora Perry of England and then lost the play-off for the bronze with another English pair.

It is a surprise that Miss Erickson is seeded below Sue Thompson, from Wellington; her current form is excellent. In the last two weeks she has won the Wellington singles title and the South Island title, beating Miss Ross in the final, 12-9, 3-11, 11-8. A remit from the Canterbury association was required to get doubles play included in the under-23 competition. In an effort to prevent any one individual dominating the intermediate class, a rule has been brought in preventing anyone who has won the singles title previously from entering again. If, as in the case of Miss Ross, a player under 23 becomes a national representative, then they are also automatically banned from participating. Therefore, Miss Erikson and Miss Ross, the past two winners of the women’s singles title, are ineligible.