The one where Tine Baun gives me her dresses.

As I didn't do the Olympic finals because they were saved for Young Games Makers, today's finals were my first ever international finals. Although this clearly wasn't something that bothered me too much, as I've actually only just realised this whilst racking my brain for a statistic to whack out for you.


After the match yesterday, I requested to do Tine's singles. I know I'm predictable, feel free to fake surprise, but mopping the last match of her career was just too exciting to pass up on.

The line judges were due to have a briefing at 10:15, and so we arrived at a similar time. I would say that this was because we were super time-aware-moppers, but it was really just because we wanted to make the most of their 10KG supply of chocolate buttons. I'm only joking. Or maybe I'm not.

Tine was the 3rd match on, so I was able to watch the men's and women's doubles, both of which China won convincingly (with China beating China potentially a little too convincingly in the women's), before I had to line up for the match. Upon lining up for the match, I was pleased to find out that I was going to be on court with some of my favourite line judges from the Olympics, one of whom has taught me something very exciting this week: how to make a high-5 turn into a snail. On the subject of high-5s, it is routine that the umpires shake your hand before and after the match, and the manager of the line judges high 5s you as you walk into the tunnel. For some reason, the pre-match high-5 was non-existent before this final, and I didn't like this change in routine too much, so resorted to grinning at one of the tunnel attendants in the hope of getting a high-5 out of it. It didn't work. And I looked very silly.


For finals, someone had also come up with the idea of the Field of Play team marching out onto court in synch with each other, and to the beat of the music. Complete with opposite-arm-and-leg-swinging-coordination. We spent a lot of time in the line-up trying to find out how to make it work (well, the line judges did anyway- I was the short one chosen to keep looking under the scaffolding of the knock-up court to check the warm-up progress of the players, and thus the time left for us to master the walking technique), but coordination was just not really happening for us. That said, though, we did attempt it, but due to the technicalities of trying to look directly ahead, whilst simultaneously negotiating a spinning door and having to check the floor for the white-tape-of-trip-hazard-potential, and having to maintain a completely straight face, whilst clearly having the marching ability of the Dad's Army platoon, we seemed to abandon the idea shortly after taking a few steps.

Upon getting to the mopping chair, feeling rather like Usain Bolt measuring out for his starting blocks, I adjusted my mop to suit my height, and the match began. I would like to think that Tine saw me and chose my side so that she was in good mopping hands for a win, but this probably was not the case. She did, however, start on my side, so I can pretend. She was playing a Thai girl, Ratchanok Inthanon, who is only 18, so it was a complete case of age vs. experience, with the winner of the match becoming either the youngest or the oldest person to ever win the All England.

I was quite surprised by the number of supposed Thai supporters in the crowd, although I suspect that they were actually the Chinese fans, and there was a minor case of Europe vs. Asia going on. We were talking earlier in the week about how loud this tournament has been, even in comparison with the Olympics (where there seemed to be a lot of polite clapping from non-badminton-playing-Brits going on) and, considering that there were no Brits left in after Thursday, the noise was pretty impressive!

The Danish fans, in all of their-matching-kit-glory, were, as always, sat in their block opposite Court 1, and, despite my Danish being fairly restricted, they seemed to be on top cheering form. The head coach of the Denmark team (and I'd noticed this on Saturday too) kept doing the 'get on the money' gesture whenever Tine looked at him after winning a point, which, in my massive attempt to remain every part the serious-mopper (or 'court attendant', as we've been called at these Championships), was coming very close to making me laugh. But, people, I held it together. I didn't smile either when she won, which it was obvious as soon as she was up in the 3rd end that she was going to, and she knew it as well as everyone else did! I was sat directly in front of the VIPs sofa and one of my quotes of the day came from a very excited Badminton England big wig who, as soon as she got to 16 in the 3rd, didn't seem to be able to stop repeating: she's going to do it, she's going to do it, she's going to do it (and so on, I'm sure you get the idea. I know I definitely did).

As Tine's win was pretty exciting, her coach told me after the match that she would take a while in media, but that she would be come to meet me when she had finished, so I sat on a random roll of carpet in the Back of House and waited, whilst trying very hard to work out the score of the men's singles final from how loud the cheering was. In the end I had worked out a fairly reliable technique: very loud cheers were for Chen Long's points, very loud cheers and a few chants were for Lee Chong Wei's points. This didn't always work, though, so my dad resorted to BBMing me the score from his computer. It was at some point during this BBM session that I looked up and realised that there was actually a livescore board directly in front of me...


Tine's coach was, meanwhile, bless him, alternating between watching the men's final, and making phone calls to update me on the media progress (which I neither needed nor asked for- I would have happily just waited!). Tine then emerged and came over to me and asked me if I would be ok to come to the stands with her, as all of her stuff was there. I, obviously said that that would be fine and went with her to the players' stand. The security-lady was slightly unsure about this, as I was authorised for the staff stand and not the one for players (despite the fact that on Friday when I tried to get into the staff stand, the security mistook me for a player and told me that I wasn't able to sit there), but I told her that I was with Tine, and Tine backed me up, and security-lady had no comeback to either of us. Booyah. We then went to her stuff and I met her family and we chatted for a bit and they took photos and it was perfect and she gave me one dress and then found another and gave me that one too! And, when I told her that I knew that she was going to win, she just gave me this all-knowing look!  Classic. She also apologised so much for not  having been able to wash the dresses, and I'm guessing that she must have sprayed them with loads of deodorant/ perfume because, in the least creepy way possible, my room currently smells of Tine Baun and not of me. She also complimented my mopping skills. Boom.

Team Mop then left the NIA and had a post-All-England-McDonalds to ease the pain of the fact that there were no more matches to mop. They then caught a very crowded train back up north, where things returned quickly to normal and a man was sick, and I was told off by a stroppy lady for kicking her chair by accident, but I didn't care one bit because I would like to be Tine Baun when I grow up.

Tine, it was an honour.