ENGLISH PLAYER GIVES MANAGER A COLA SHOWER
by Mike Grossman

February 23, 1997 (NEW SHUTTLENWS) - According to badminton players who frequent the English National Badminton Centre in Milton Keynes, English national team player Joanne Muggeridge recently gave Steve Baddeley, the English director of elite play and the national badminton team manager, a shower of a cold cola drink. Unfortunately, the shower was not in celebration of a great victory as is the tradition in North American sports but was an outpouring of anger and pique from the women's singles specialist.

Baddeley was reportedly giving Muggeridge a talking-to about her training. The discussion became heated and ended with Muggeridge pouring the contents of a can of cola over Baddeley's head.

After the incident, Muggeridge was suspended indefinitely from the national team. Muggeridge is also reported to have said that she had no desire to ever play on the England team again.

Muggeridge is no stranger to controversy. In the runup to the 1992 Olympic Games, she was suspended from the British team by then national coach Lee Jae Bok because of her negative attitude towards training. She was reinstated after much debate and discussion over the power of the national coach to suspend a member of the team. Coincidentally, Steve Baddeley was the Olympic team manager at that time.

Muggeridge also made the English sports headlines after the 1992 Olympics when her father, Vic, was involved in a headbutting incident with a badminton court official over disputed calls during one of Muggeridge's matches at a local English tournament.

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