Malaysia vs Japan. Korea vs Chinese Taipei. Yes, you read it right. These are two of the four quarter-finals in this year’s Sudirman Cup. In case you still haven’t realized what is wrong with it, these four teams have played each other in the final match of the group stage and they are playing each other the next day in the quarter-finals. At this point, you must be wondering: Why are they playing each other again? For all team events including Thomas Cup, Uber Cup, and Sudirman Cup, the Badminton World Federation (BWF) conducted a draw ceremony right after the conclusion of the group stage to determine the four match-ups for the quarter-finals. The draw only guarantees teams that finished top of the group will play a team that finished second in the group. In other words, there is a chance that teams that played each other in the group stage will face each other in the knockout stage. To understand why BWF made such a decision, we need to go back in time. Back in the 2008 Thom...