Thomas Cup 2022 – UPSC Notes

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Sports is always an exciting factor and event of experience for each and every person. There will be nobody who is non interested towards any of the sports events. Every person will have their own favorite sports event. After football and cricket, Badminton is one of the most favorite sports events. India is redefining its position in the world Badminton sports as the last years Olympics is an example for that. PV Sindhu has marked India’s position in World Badminton. If you are a badminton enthusiast or a competitive general awareness builder, you might have heard about the Thomas Cup 2022. After many years, India has marked its position in the Thomas cup 2022. Are you confused about what the Thomas Cup is? You might have understood it is related to badminton but let us check what is Thomas Cup and its significance

Thomas Cup – History and Overview

Named after Sir George Thomas, Founder-President of the International Badminton Federation (BWF) and a highly successful English badminton player of the early 1900s, the Thomas Cup tournament was proposed by him in 1939. With Thomas Cup, Sir Thomas aimed to create teams among badminton players. However, when World War II erupted, the plan got postponed first and when war ended, the Thomas Cup championship was planned for 1948-49.

The Thomas Cup is also known as the World Men’s Team Championships. It is a global badminton tournament held every two years. It is played between teams representing member countries of the Badminton World Federation (BWF), the sport’s regulatory body. Since 1982, the tournaments have been contested every two years. It has previously been held every three years since its first event in 1948–1949. All the badminton playing nations were categorized into Asian, Australian, Pan-American, and European. The format followed was the players would play five singles and four doubles. 30 competitions for Thomas Cup have been contested since 1948–1949, and only six nations have lifted the cup so far. Indonesia is the most victorious team with 14 victories. China, which started competing in 1982, is in second place with 10 championships and Malaysia has five championships. In the 2014 final, Japan became the fourth nation to lift the Thomas Cup after defeating Malaysia. Copenhagen became the first European and fifth country to win the Thomas Cup after defeating Indonesia in the 2016 final. This was the very first time the tournament has been won by a non-Asian team.

India is the current title holder, having won the very first championship in 2022 after defeating defending champions Indonesia by 3-0. The Indian team has reached the Thomas Cup semi-finals in 1952, 1955, and 1979.

Thomas Cup and Uber Cup

Thomas Cup and Uber Cup are closely related to each other. They are the biennial international badminton championships contested by the men and women’s national teams respectively. Uber Cup is the global women’s team championship. The championship’s final stage has 12 teams participating at locations in the host country, and it runs simultaneously with the Uber Cup, the global women’s team championship.

Thomas Cup Significance in 2022

The 2022 Thomas is the 32nd edition of the Thomas Cup. The tournament was hosted at Bangkok, Thailand from 8 to 15 May 2022. India defeated Indonesia in the Thomas cup finals by 3-0. The Indonesian team is the defending champions. India started with Lakshya Sen defeating Anthony Ginting of Indonesia. India’s doubles pair Satwik and Chirag defeated Ahsan-Sukamuljo to give India a 2-0 lead. In the third game, Kidambi Srikanth defeated Jonatan Christie to make it 3-0. The Indonesian team became the Thomas Cup 2022 silver medalist and; Denmark and Japan became the bronze medallists.

Conclusion

To know about these events is motivation building for a sports enthusiast. If you are a sports person in your mind, read through this article with an aim that, one day my name will also appear in such kind of news. If you are not a sports kind of person and who is preparing for any competitive examination, study the facts associated with the Thomas Cup and its significance in 2022. It might be asked in every current affairs related competitive examination. Keep studying. Keep winning.