Final preparations are underway for the BKS Optima Bahrain International Challenge (BIC) 2016 Badminton Tournament at Bahrain Keraleeya Samajam (BKS) Diamond Jubilee Hall from tomorrow until Sunday.
The tournament will be conducted by BKS in association with Bahrain Badminton and Squash Federation (BBSF).
The tournament, sanctioned by the Badminton World Federation (BWF) and Badminton Asia Confederation (BAC), has a prize purse of $17,500. It carries world ranking points and attracts top-ranked players from all over the world. It is is one of the major sporting events in the GCC region and attracts more than 5000 spectators.
The tournament has five events – men’s singles, men’s doubles, women’s singles, women’s doubles and mixed doubles.
Badminton Asia Confederation has appointed Zheng Sanliang from China as the tournament referee who will be overseeing the proceedings of the tournament along with her deputy Ashley George from Bahrain. Nahathai Sornprachum, who had officiated as deputy referee at Rio Olympics, will be the Badminton Asia referee assessor. Other officials include Badminton Asia Events Manager Chooi Weng Sheng, who arrives today.
Participate
Around 100 players and officials from nine countries will participate in the four-day event. The largest contingent is from India while the other participating countries are Bahrain, Egypt, Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Russian, England and Belgium. Players and officials have started arriving in the kingdom.
India’s Anand Pawar and Maxime Moreels from Belgium are the top-ranked players in the men’s section while Egyptian Hadia Hosny and Indian P C Thulasi head the women’s seedings.
Matches kick off at 6pm on all days except Friday, when the morning session starts at 10am. Entry is free.
Optima is the title sponsor of the event. The major sponsors are Al Marai, Bahrain Airport Services, Sinmar and BMMI while the other sponsors are Ahmed Zayani, Airmech, Bemco, Travelogiks, Philips, AMG, UAE Exchange, Delmon Optic, Babar, Al Kuwaiti, Gulf Diabetics, Air India, Sarab Contracting, Ashraf’s, Al Dossary, Unifrom Express, Matha Advertisement, LG, Segayya Restaurant, KNR Group, Nitro Sports Company and Finsoft Softwares.