A wet market's worth of duck feathers have been shredded this week, all in the process of reaching the stage, later today, of crowning five world champions in Birmingham's National Indoor Arena. But the feathers that have been flying are not just those glued to the cork base of a shuttlecock.
The week started with a flap as the relationship between the Asian and European factions in the upper echelons of the sport's administration took to the air.
A parting shot from Denmark's Tom Bacher, after he was ousted as a long-standing vice-president of the International Badminton Federation (IBF), claimed that Asia's attempts to dominate the sport's administration was putting their Olympic status at risk.
Such are the rumblings around the sport - there are factions that believe the postponement of the original world championships in May had more to do with politics than Sars - that some even suggest that a European withdrawal from the IBF is a worst-case scenario.
That would be suicide. Without a genuine world body behind it, badminton would be out of the Olympics faster than Ben Johnson and that is something the sport cannot afford to risk. The US$6 million the IBF may receive as its share of the TV rights for the next Olympic cycle is more than 50 per cent of its budget.
Meanwhile, it has been calculated that grants from governments and national Olympic committees are worth another US$110 million to all badminton's national associations. To jeopardise that would be the ultimate example of cutting off one's nose to spite one's face.