Michelle Li

Michelle Li was born in Hong Kong to Chi Keung Li and Agnes Kwong, together with brother Mark they moved to Canada in 1997. An active child, she started playing badminton at age 11 with her mom at the local community center. A friend introduced her to her current club where she began lessons and competing locally in small tournaments. She started competing internationally when she was around 17 years old. Li graduated from Richmond Hill High School and is an undergraduate student at Rotman Commerce at the University of Toronto.

One of Li's early notable performances came at the 2011 Canada Winter Games in Halifax, Nova Scotia. There she won gold in the women's singles event and followed that performance with a gold in the doubles event with Alexandra Bruce. Due to this success she was then named the flag bearer for Team Ontario at the closing ceremonies for the games.[2]

Later that year Li was the gold medal winner in the women's doubles event alongside Bruce at the 2011 Pan American Games.[3] Li would then go on the next day to win the women's singles competition, completing a second games double gold appearance that year, this time in Guadalajara.[4]

At the 2012 Summer Olympics, Bruce and Li finished last in the round-robin portion of the women's doubles tournament, losing all three of their matches.[5] However, the top two teams in the group were disqualified for attempting to intentionally lose matches so they would have an easier match-up in the quarterfinals.[6] The duo was advanced to their quarterfinals, where they defeated Australia's Leanne Choo and Renuga Veeran. Bruce and Li finished in fourth place, the best Canadian finish in badminton at the Olympic Games.[5]

In 2013, Li entered into the finals of the Macau Open Grand Prix Gold, defeating Hong Kong top player Yip Pui Yin in the semi-finals, making her the first Pan American athlete to ever enter into a singles final of a Grand Prix Gold event since that series began in 2007. In 2014, she also entered into the quarter-finals of the All England Open Badminton Championships Super Series Premier, beating Tai Tzu-ying in the first round, making her, in 35 years, the first Canadian player to enter at the least the quarter-finals of this prestigious tournament. Later in 2014, Li won the Canada Open Grand Prix, making her the first home player to win this title ever since it became a Grand Prix event.

Li won the gold medal at the 2014 Commonwealth Games defeating Kirsty Gilmour of Scotland in the final.[7] She thus became the first Canadian woman to win a singles gold in Commonwealth badminton.[8]

At the 2015 Pan American Games, Li successfully defended her title, defeating fellow Canadian Rachel Honderich in the final.[9]

Michelle had several operations in 2016 to fix nagging injuries sustained earlier in her career. She took a year off in 2017 to heal from the operations and to focus on a comeback for 2018. After deeming herself fully fit she entered the stage relatively quietly in 2018 until she made a landmark win against the 3rd seed Ratchanok Intanon in round 16 of the All England Open. She had not defeated Intanon previously. Michelle's progress was clear as she moved quickly around the court playing much lighter on her feet than her previous years.

During the 2018 Thomas Uber Cup, Li again played well. She defeated India's Saina Nehwal, who she had not previously beaten, by 21-15, 16-21, 16-21. Li spearheaded Canada to their first ever Uber Cup quarterfinal and she defeated Sung Ji Hyun (21-14, 21-15). Canada eventually lost 3-1 to Korea.

In the 2019 Japan Open, Li played and defeated the No 1 seed, Tai Tzu-ying (21-15, 15-21, 22-20) to reach the semis.

Includes Players who have been Year-end Finals finalists, World Championships semifinalists or Olympic quarterfinalists at least.[12] (Last updated as at 17 March 2020)

• Petya Nedelcheva (1—0)
• Chen Yufei (1—4)
• He Bingjiao (0—5)
• Li Xuerui (1—2)
• Wang Shixian (0—1)
• Wang Xin (0—1)
• Wang Yihan (0—6)
• Cheng Shao-chieh (0—1)
• Tai Tzu-ying (2—7)
• Tine Baun (0—2)
• Tracey Hallam (1—0)
• Pi Hongyan (0—1)
• Juliane Schenk (0—3)
• Yip Pui Yin (2—2)
• Saina Nehwal (1—2)
• P. V. Sindhu (2—6)
• Lindaweni Fanetri (0—2)
• Minatsu Mitani (1—3)
• Nozomi Okuhara (3—7)
• Akane Yamaguchi (0—4)
• Bae Yeon-ju (0—3)
• Sung Ji-hyun (2—3)
• Carolina Marín (2—3)
• Porntip Buranaprasertsuk (1—1)
• Ratchanok Intanon (1—6)

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Michelle Li.

• Michelle Li at BWF.tournamentsoftware.com
• Michelle Li at Olympics at Sports-Reference.com (archived)
• Badminton Canada profile PDF
• Michelle Li at gc2018.com