New Zealand National Team Named

The New Zealand team for the badminton’s Sudirman Cup World Team Championships (world mixed teams event) to be played in Malaysia, 19-26 May has been confirmed with two players to make their national team debut.

Susannah Leydon-Davis from the well-known Leydon-Davis Waikato sporting family and Waitakere’s Kritteka Gregory will both be representing New Zealand for the first time at senior level.

The full New Zealand team is Amanda Brown and Susannah Leydon-Davis both from the Waikato and Kritteka Gregory as well as Michelle Chan who is currently ranked at 54 in the world in singles in the world.

The men are Kevin Dennerly-Minturn from Auckland, Oliver Leydon-Davis, the brother of Susannah and New Zealand’s top singles player, Joe Wu who is ranked at 123 in the world. 

All selections are done on current BWF(Badminton World Federation) rankings. The majority of the New Zealand team are currently based in Denmark. Only the Waikato pair of Brown and Susannah Leydon-Davis and Wu are not currently based in Europe.

Top seeds for the tournament are China, followed by Denmark and Malaysia third. New Zealand are seeded 25th out of 32 teams and are ranked above Australia in Group 3.

The coach, Jihyun Marr is a former Olympic medalist for Korea and former Korean  national women’s singles coach.

New Zealand Sudirman Cup team:
Women:
Amanda Brown (Waikato)
Michelle Chan (Auckland)
Kritteka Gregory (Waitakere)
Susannah Leydon- Davis (Waikato)
Men:
Kevin Dennerly-Minturn (Auckland)
Oliver Leydon-Davis (Waikato)
Joe Wu (Northland)
Coach – Jihyun Marr
Manager – Roger Southby