Umpire quits over Olympic selection

Badminton

Stewart Hague, a leading official, has resigned from the Umpires' Association after 25 years on being passed over for the Olympics Games in Atlanta. The umpire is protesting against a selection process he believes to be haphazard and unpredictable.

"Good umpires are being overlooked, and I'm not just talking about myself," he said. "The selection seems to show a lot of bias these days. It is so frustrating. I hope my resignation raises a few eyebrows and helps the lot of umpires."

Hague, 51, is still four years short of the International Federation retiring age for umpires. He was involved in controversy at the Barcelona Olympics when he called a service fault against a Chinese pair in the women's doubles final.

He complains of a lack of communication from the IBF, whose president is China's Lu Shengrong, the first Asian woman to head an international sporting organisation.

"No one ever tells you if you have done a good job at a tournament, or a bad one," Hague said. "If it is felt you have not done well you never know until you are not invited to the next major tournament. How can you improve your standards if no one tells you where you are going wrong?"