Great performance by the Indonesians. Deserved win. The Danes did their best to give a good fight, but didn´t seem to have the masterplan. Also it felt that whenever they leveled the score the Inonesians can bring 3% more concentration into their shots and pulled again away... It has to be so difficult to play this fast Indo pair. What I personally don't like about matches with Gideon/Kevin is that there is no rhythm to it. It is a different spectacular to the classic matches bt LYD/JJS vs. CY/FHF or vs MA/HS. I miss this time with long rallies where the offense changes several times and esp with the Koreans having so strong defense. Nowadays it s a lot about fast and flat play, coming to points rather quick, sometimes it seems to get crazy and hard to follow haha
Just analyzed the video again, Kevin started running towards the net even when the shuttle was still roughly above the net (or about to go above the net), terrifying game reading skill...
Also amazing that there was no showboting or angry faces towards each other or other cheaky things. I was positively suprised. Being so talented and dominating the MD they really, really don't need such antics... emotions yes but not being disrespectful and teaching young kids to behave in the same way. #rolemodelfunction!!!
yes, but it was more apparent from Kevin this time for some reason, I feel that Kevin even move a tad bit earlier than the match vs LiLiu... I heard from many people that Kevin has had this special talent ever since he started playing badminton, thus toying with a lot of his opponents since his junior level time, and still he's still doing it for fun today... that's fantastic, borderline terrifying for opponents since this talent is something that's almost impossible to learn by practice...
I think this MD Final is so so. Its not hugely entertaining as in if KevinGideon vs LiLiu (Like @Indomasters and HK) but I think thats they way BoeMogensen play too. As for long rallies, I think thats how MD has evolved throughout the years. The reason because in the past, those pairs are only using Powers. With speed , they will all be blasted by Kevin. Nowadays MD play with speed. and a little good defence. You know its hard to analyse MD everything is so tight. There is no time to worry too much.
yeah remember how LinDan used to wanna smash at the KoreaCoach ? 2007/8 KoreaOpen i think. Thats 100x worst. In the end, everyone grows up.
Talk is cheap - exactly. But in a discussion forum, it's all we have. I think I have a much better idea than you what it takes to play badminton at that level age 34 to be honest. It takes a crazy amount of hard work, desire and clever use of your brain. I'm in now way denying that. But even at age 34 you can still fight till the end, also when you're tired. I appreciate Lin Dan and his devotion to badminton. It's honourable how he is still one of the top players after so many years, but it doesn't mean I can't be disappointed about him when he's throwing in the towel midway through the final game.
He didn't give up, that's why he won G2 despite the odds, and in the decider it's simply beyond his aged, tired body. Mind you, it's the final, the 5th consecutive match in a top-level event, and his opponent is a generation younger in badminton terms. Like I said, the spirit is willing, the flesh is weak, either his shots kept coming back or went awry, and as @Jonc108 lamented out, even luck was against him. What to do ? That's life. Imagine, had he won G1, what might probably be the final outcome ? We can speculate all we want, what if, if only, but what's done is done. The kind of scenario that played out isn't new, it happened occasionally to many other players before, I'm sure. To be honest, I am disappointed too. But , the fact is such a defeat is nothing to be ashamed of, esp considering who he beat en route to the final. And, I hasten to add, it in no way detracts from his true greatness, The GOAT of MS Badminton. On the contrary, it speaks volumes of how a 34-yr-old athlete can still perform at such a high level beyond most expectations. I trust his peers like LCW, Lee HI, Hu Yun, Wei Nan, even HKV, all past 30, wouldn't be too disappointed and might even envy him. Anyway, I'm waiting to see how he may fare in the other two majors , the Nanjing WC , a six-round event (one more than the AE) and the Asian Games, not to mention other WTS1000 and WTS750 events.
wd observations: fate can sometimes reward longevity. good on them. the next shot to change wd is the fast drop, fast cut shot, from the baseline. right now nobody is using one in wd, or at least i haven't seen it. it is used in all other events effectively. all i see during an attempt to deceive the opponent with a drop (instead of a smash) is a slow looping shot that is not fooling anybody or throwing anybody off balance. md observations: it was flashy vs. steady kss gets faster every match. how long can he keep it that up? marcus played great this whole tournament. their future rides on his health. mfg/kss are the tai tzu ying of md.
tournament observations: i like the absence of qualifying. i think qualifying should be eliminated for all professional tournaments. if you want to play in a particular tournament play wherever you have to play to get your ranking to wherever it needs to be to qualify for the tournament you want to play. again, i absolutely love the service rule. as i predicted, the flick serve is a potential weapon now. this is definitely a good thing for the game. two clear cut dominating forces: tty & mfg/kss. why? in a word: creativity and flair. they are not products of machine learning, if you know what i mean. xd continues to be my favorite event to watch. i agree w/ 1 & 2. for me #3 was tty vs. ay. why? i guess it's the way she won. in game one i thought '22-20? damn, yamaguchi is getting close to tty overall.' then in game two i be like 'oh wait, she's not.'
Thank god Shi Yuqi did not disappoint by crumbling under the pressure easily. I would have been quite disappointed to see his potential go to waste. Great performance by Uncle Lin throughout the tournament. He promised to peak at AE and he delivered. I couldn't ask for more especially after the attacking game he played against LCW which was a treat to watch. Have had high hopes for Shi for an year now and it's great to see him produce results. Hopefully this is just the beginning for him. Great tournament in general by TTY and Minions. Both are such a pleasure to watch given their unique styles.
It wasn't terryfying game reading skill, you may forget that every front court players should take any chance to be near net position to get advantage of being front court player. It will be terryfying move if it was done when they are under attack and the player move into the front. The normal position of any double plair should be like these: - Attacking or setting an attacking mode : front-back position - Defending or after high lifting the shuttle : side-by-side position
Shi Yuqi played an AMAZING game. I really don't think it's fair to discredit him because Lin Dan is older; I don't think there are many players full stop that could have kept up Shi Yuqi's pace. Happy to see he remained relatively injury free; last year he put so much in, but it just didn't happen because of his injury. It must've been a huge relief to win today.
All this talk about MS final being fixed and LD throwing the match away is bogus.. why is there always talk of that when China is playing? LD has just become vulnerable now that he older and all players have gotten confidence in going all out against him. OOTH I feel very happy for Danes WD Congrats!
I think nobody notice that Christinna Pedersen/Kamilla Rytter Juhl bring back the AE WD title after the last time Denmark won it at 1964/1965 by Karin Jørgensen/Ulla Strand and the mixed nationality NED/DEN Imre Rietveld/Ulla Strand at 1967. I think the AE Champion is another milestone which Christinna Pedersen/Kamilla Rytter Juhl try to achieve in their career.
Sometimes they do it to manipulate seeding for bigger events like the Olympics, but I don't think there was any fixing in this match. They both played extremely hard.
