London: England’s badminton head coach Jakob Hoi has challenged England to continue their medal success at the European Mixed Team Championships this week in Leuven, Belgium.
England will be hoping to improve on the team bronze medal they won in Moscow in 2013, and will contest for the title with defending champions Germany and Denmark.
Hoi said: “We want to medal. We are here to showcase the best we have and we want the chance to stand up against Denmark.”
Seeded England will face Ireland (featuring Chloe Magee, Sam Magee and the dangerous Scott Evans) at 10am on Thursday and take on hosts Belgium, starting at 7pm, in their group stage campaign.
Should they progress, Hoi anticpates a draw against either Scotland, Holland, France or Poland in Friday’s last eight.
“It will be tricky as all the teams have won the right to be here,” he said. “It will be interesting as we have been training for a long time for this.
“There’s no doubt that we have a strong mixed doubles in Chris and Gabby Adcock, while Raj(Ouseph) has a strong record when it comes to team environment. He always seems to step up.”
The Adcocks have travelled to Belgium alongside doubles specialists’ Andy Ellis, Marcus Ellis, Chris Langridge, Peter Mills, Heather Olver and Lauren Smith.
Ouseph, Toby Penty, Fontaine Chapman and Chloe Birch will lead England’s men’s and women’s singles assault in the 12-team tournament.
Since 1998, England have won five silver medals while they last beat Denmark to gold in 1984.
Badminton England
