VA doesn’t mind three games. But it is always easier to play only two VA picked the difficult side (tailwind), so he could finish a third game on the easier side (headwind). That means he didn’t expect to win in two games.
Players have been doing this for ages. Neither AA nor LZJ invented this. If BWF want to prevent this, they need to change the scoring. Right now LZJ is doing his best to win.. the match.
LZJ is playing really well. His defense, net shots, and especially offense are all working for him. VA is struggling right now.
It’s tough to play LZJ right now when everything is working for him. VA wants to do net shots but LZJ does tighter or even kills it. If VA plays to the back court, LZJ does 1 shot kill.
If he had tried harder in the 2nd set, I would have probably won the bet. Mistake on my side for not covering when LZJ only won 21-19 on the first set.
VA is good form right now but LZJ played better in this match. It’s just he lost focus latter part of second game and towards the end of 3rd game.
Wao… crazy last few points… tied at 16-16, VA scored 4 straight point for that but he can't grab the game point. Lzj rally a 5 points come back. Finally an epic rally at 21-21, VA won it with 23-21.
It goes to say that having light flashes in your face can really disturb your concentration. That flash thing really shook VA's concentration and he ended up loosing 4 matchpoint. Luckily he still won in the end.
He did not really lose focus but he just wanted to conserve energy. But I thought as the underdog, he is going to want to try harder for every point.