Whatever it is that has made Robert Blair, Imogen Bankier and Kirsty Gilmour so determined to work in Scotland rather than be based at GB Badminton's headquarters it is clearly not the prospect of being pampered.

The trio have all turned down involvement in the bigger programme at Milton Keynes in favour of the more intimate surroundings of Scotstoun and their results this season would seem to justify the decision.

Gilmour has raced more than 100 places up the women's singles rankings in the past year or so and is second seed in that discipline at the Scottish Open Grand Prix which starts at the Emirates Arena on Wednesday.

In the women's doubles she and compatriot Jillie Cooper are also second seeds behind Bankier and her Bulgarian partner Petra Netelcheva, while Bankier and Blair, who once turned his back on Scotland to compete for England, but is now well and truly back in the fold, are seeded fifth in the mixed doubles. Both world championship silver medallists in the past they, too, have surged up the rankings since Bankier told GB Badminton she was quitting their set-up a year ago, since re-forming the partnership with Blair that won at this event in 2007.

The progress of Scotland's badminton elite is supervised by a woman who, by her own admission, seems a severe figure far from out of place in the land that produced the greatest of hard-line coaches such as Stein, Shankly, Ferguson and Telfer.

Yvette Yun Luo, who has been Badminton Scotland's head coach for the past three years, readily acknowledges that her outlook differs from much of what she sees around her. "In China we say that if I praise you in front of you it means I lie to you because I want you to like me. If I praise you behind you that is true. It's not about trying to please you," she explained.

"My coaching philosophy is slightly different from the Western way. I try to be honest with the players and there might be some people who can't take it at the beginning. They wonder why you are saying something different from everyone else, who are telling them they are brilliant, but at the end of the day there are winners and if you win then players can reflect on what they have done. But if you keep telling them they are brilliant then they are wondering how come they lose.

"I think it is about your ­background and different coaches are raised in different cultures and tell players how good they are. They tend to make players happier, but I think you have to be two-way. Sometimes you can have positive stimulus but if you have that too often it can breed complacency.

"The Western way is always about positive reinforcement and being able to turn negative things to positives so I have combined that with my culture, learning a little bit from that."

The basis of that philosophy albeit, as Yun Luo acknowledges, tempered slightly by exposure to Western sensibilities, is almost inevitably the consequence of coming from what is a relatively brutal sporting regime. Yun Luo was effectively spat out by the system at the age of 26 which, apparently, is quite late for Chinese badminton players.

"Because in China the competition is severe they force people to retire so that younger people can come through," says Yun Luo, who moved to Australia to coach and to study when her playing career ended in 1990.

"Here you can play much longer because you can use your experience and tactical knowledge and maturity, but in Asia the speed and power easily overtakes you."

Both that experience, and the outlook it engendered, meant that when GB Badminton authorities were getting excited about the academy they were setting up in Milton Keynes, she had a sobering message for them.

"I told them that in China they have 25 or 26 of those types of centres," Yun Luo says.

Which is not to suggest she is fatalistic about the prospects of producing champion athletes from smaller talent pools. It is to that end that, after nine years with the GB Badminton set-up, to which she was recruited after the Sydney Olympics, she took the chance to move to Scotland.

"Part of the reason I came here is because you want to work with talented players which will maximise the effects of your time and effort," she said.

To that end she has actually been rather more protective of the 20-year-old Gilmour than some others would prefer.

"I've had some disagreements with GB Badminton because they want to send her to the bigger Asian tournaments but I know how difficult those challenges are and she's too vulnerable at this stage. I want her swimming in the pool steady and then you move to the sea. I don't want her to get lost in the sea too soon," Yun Luo said.

The teacher is pleased with the progress she has seen in that pupil and others, too, as she indicates when looking towards what is considered the big prize - success at next year's Commonwealth Games.

"When I speak to sportscotland people I tell them that obviously if you're going to win medals it's not going to come out of the blue," Yun Luo said.

"Scotland has a better chance than ever. It's a realistic chance because we have two or three opportunities to get medals. In the past we've only had one or two."