Robert Summers ready to defend double's title at All-Africa Championships
Among the players chosen is Robert Summers who along with his doubles partner Jarred Elliott won gold at the 2023 All-Africa Championships.
South African badminton player Robert Summers at the All- Africa Championships 2023. Picture: robertsummers_official/ Instagram.
JOHANNESBURG – Badminton South Africa has named the players who will represent the country at the upcoming All-Africa Championships. The tournament will take place in Cairo, Egypt from 12-18 February.
Among the players chosen is Robert Summers who - along with his doubles partner Jarred Elliott - won gold at the 2023 All-Africa Championships.
“I’m excited and privileged to represent South Africa, I’m grateful to be selected and to represent South Africa. I and Jared Elliot won the gold in the doubles last year so obviously we would love to repeat that and defend our title,” said Summers.
The Badminton Championships is a continental stage tournament of the Thomas and Uber Cups. It is organised by the Badminton Confederation of Africa (BCA) to crown the best national men's and women's badminton teams in Africa.
South African badminton player Robert Summers doubles partner Jarred Elliott at the All-Africa Championships 2023. Picture: robertsummers_official/ Instagram.
“In the singles, I become the first out of 6 men and the first after Jacob Maliekal to win a medal for South Africa. I won a bronze so I’m hoping to be one step forward and get into the final and win a gold,” said Summers of the All-Africa Championships.
Jacob Maliekal represented South Africa at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games and is a five-time consecutive All-African Men's Singles champion. At the 2023 Championship Team SA brought home seven medals.
Summers is currently the national champion in the men’s singles and has won a few national titles in singles, doubles and mixed. And represented SA at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham.
“How I prepare mentally is by putting in the work by doing that it gives you confidence and you know that you have been putting in the work and you have done everything you can to be here today and what needs to happen will happen and, in that sense, it also helps relieve a bit of pressure.”
The player who has represented South Africa at several World Junior Championships tells Eyewitness News that badminton isn’t popular in South Africa but it’s growing in Africa as a whole.
“In Africa, badminton isn’t one of the bigger sports but in the World and Asia, it’s the second biggest sport in the world after soccer. I do think that badminton is a growing sport in Africa and that it’s slowly becoming big in Africa, in South Africa, it’s not that big but I think we are also far away from everything especially the other countries that compete in the sports so it not so popular here and also, we grew up with rugby and netball so it’s not one of the big sports codes.”
Badminton is a relatively small sporting code in South Africa - meaning atheletes like Summers struggle to secure sponsorship to compete abroad.
Moreover, they miss out on opportunities to compete in Olympic-qualifying competitions.
“It's a really small sport and I think a lot of effort, time and money needs to go into the development of badminton, but I think a simple way is getting it into your schools as a school sport giving coaching courses so kids can be introduced to the sports. I do a bit of coaching giving back to the community in Kimberly where I’m actually from I coach the kids and try to get them to love the sports, so I do think it needs to be introduced to kids more and to schools.”
TEAM SA:
Womens Team
Amy Ackerman
Deidre Laurens
Diane Olivier
Johanita SCholtz
Megan de Beer
Mens Team
Caden Kakora
Cameron Coetzer
Jarred Elliott
Robert Summers