The game was played in a knockout system , the eight best athletes were seeded and could only meet in the quarter-finals. The first surprise came on the very first day of the competition when Ronald Susilo from Singapore knocked the number one seed, Lin Dan (China) out of the tournament. In the following rounds, further favorites were eliminated from the tournament prematurely. In the round of 16 these were Wong Choong Hann (3rd place in the ranking) and Bao Chunlai (4th in the ranking). With the defeats of Chen Hong and Lee Hyun-il , the first five players on the seeding list were eliminated in the round of 16.
Surprisingly, the Olympic champion was Indonesian Taufik Hidayat , who defeated third-placed Wong Choong Hann from Malaysia and sixth-placed Peter Gade from Denmark on the way to the final . In the final he was able to prevail in two sets (15: 8, 15: 7) against the South Korean Shon Seung-mo , who was seeded as number seven.
The silver medal also went to an Indonesian, Sony Dwi Kuncoro , who won the bronze medal against Boonsak Ponsana from Thailand.
Badminton tournaments at the 
