The Scottish men’s doubles duo of Alex Dunn and Adam Hall are leading the new generation of their country’s badminton. Dunn opens up about what this means for them. 

The Scottish and Austrian Open champions are in fine form. With this comes an element of expectation. Asking Dunn is this adds to the pressure on them at all. Dunn responds.  

- No, I don’t really feel any pressure. I always look at the opportunity that we and the younger players have in the squad to make a name for Scotland. Before we have only ever had maybe one or two world-class players in a generation, and I think a goal for the squad is to have all of us at that level and we can push each other to do so. I think for any professional athlete the goal is to be the best in the world and be on top of the podium at all the major championships. Of course, I’m no different.

 Looking to the future, Dunn postulates about the main realistic goals they can achieve. 

- I feel it is quite a difficult question to answer. We had sat down and talked about goals for this season which have kind of taken a wrong turn now due to the virus. But yeah, I think we need to keep looking at our progression and climbing the rankings and making headway in the tour in Super 300, 500, and 750 tournaments. We will take each season as it comes and figure out our new goals. 

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Scottish pride

For England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, an Olympic year means a focus on ‘Team GB’, and the qualification for the prestigious Games. This also means extra pressure for places. Scotland’s Kirsty Gilmour is in pole position to represent GB, however, Dunn and Hall have to compete with a number of strong pairs from England. Sharing his feelings towards Team GB, Dunn says. 

- I would prefer it to be ‘Team Scotland’, not because it could potentially mean less competition when qualifying, but because we play pretty much every other tournament as Scotland and feel more pride with Scotland on the back of my shirt. When it comes to the GB competition for Olympics, I don’t really have too much opinion on it. It is a difficult thing to qualify for, so I think it is best to focus on our performances if it came down to it. I really feel me and Adam are not far at all from the top pairs from having played the likes of Chris (Langridge) and Marcus (Ellis) in training before. 

-But the big difference is when it comes to a tournament, I feel we still need consistency in producing close to, if not our best in matches. We actually had a good run of momentum from our last tournaments before they got cancelled which is annoying, Dunn adds. 

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A goal of grabbing a medal 

Both Dunn and Hall also play mixed doubles. More and more players in recent years are specialising in one category. Asking why they are playing both, Dunn responds. 

- One reason I have started is due to the fact that Ciara (Torrance) is now partnering Julie (Macpherson), so we are hoping that their partnership will do well to be at the same level of tournaments as Adam, myself and Julie. Which also means there is an opportunity for me and Ciara to play mixed at these tournaments and our coach Ingo (Kindervater) I think doesn’t want us to specialise as he sees an opportunity for two good mixed pairs and of course more chances to play and gain experience. 

Lastly, the Commonwealth Games is a significant event in the calendar, particularly for the individual ‘Home Nations’. Speaking about this, Dunn states. 

- The next Commonwealth Games is a big goal of ours and for that year it will be our top priority I can imagine, with a goal of grabbing a medal for sure. A lot can happen in four years but hopefully, all of it will be a good progression for me and Adam. I like to think by that period we will be within the top few pairs in Europe and pushing top 20 in the world rankings, which of course would put us in a really good place to qualify.