Badminton Asia president Anton Subowo denies China are in crisis after their shuttlers missed out on a singles medal at the Asian Games for the first time in 38 years.
Top-seeded Chinese Shi Yuqi crashed out in the opening round in Jakarta to Indonesian gold winner Jonatan Christie, while another local favourite Anthony Sinisuka Ginting took down Olympic champion Chen Long in the quarter-finals.
The Badminton Asia chief told AFP in an interview that China's dominance of the sport will continue because of their ability to churn out young and talented players regularly.
"They are still the best. Chinese will always have enough players in the pool to bring them up and make them world champions," said Subowo, who is from Indonesia, and is also vice-president of the Badminton World Federation (BWF).
"It was just unlucky that they did not have a good day in this Asian Games. Otherwise they are pretty good. Chen Long, Shi Yuqi are top players," he added.
Subowo played down comments by China's singles coach Xia Yuze, who called the Jakarta badminton arena a "devil's home" due to the drift coming from the air conditioners.
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Subowo said the breeze that the Chinese are talking about is "not unusual" to badminton courts around the world and top players know how to handle it.
He was also impressed with the new breed of Indonesia giant-killers who took the Asian Games by storm.
While Subowo said that the country may never see another Taufik Hidayat -- the Indonesian legend who captured world and Olympic gold -- players like the Ginting demonstrate that the future was bright.
- Indonesian young blood -
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"We have also spoken to (Pullela) Gopichand -- the India coach -- to help us develop this new training centre in his Hyderabad academy to help West Asian players practise and help the development programme."