There are a couple of issues. First of all, he is employed by a different corporation, hence, there would be a problem with training time Second, his physique, speed, and lightness around the court actually resemble Yuta. I am not sure if having two players with similar traits works in MD. What do you think?
Not looking particularly good for Naraoka, who is in dire need of more speed and variation in his game. Christie is so solid.
At least there's no Papaoka in sight. Agree with you on the speed. His game is also quite easily readable; Christie was always in control and could do what he wanted throughout.
That sucks. Great defense, speed, creativity. Attack is where they can fall short. I think it can be successful pairing if either of them can develop a devastating smash, few not so tall players used to have great/good smash, JJS, Markis Kido
Naraoka cannot get through with his smash. He needs to work on angle and placement to make up for the lack of firepower. On the other hand. Christie was putting those smashes down almost every time he went for the attack. Naraoka will likely meet Srikanth in next week's R2, another player with good attacks. Lots of homework for him to take home after these two weeks.
To beat Srikanth, hairpin net tumbles would be a must for Naraoka. Once you make him unsure at the net, his rest of the game dwindles
Takahashi Asuka lost to the same Goh Jin Wei who had been away from competitive badminton for the last couple of years due to an illness, and Ohori lost 10-21 in the second game to Sindhu after leading 8-4. The coaches should start prepping someone else for that last spot on Team A because these two are not going anywhere. Kawakami collapsed onto court after beating Michelle Li in three not very close games. The same Michelle Li who recently lost to an American whose name is not ZBW. It's safe to say that Kawakami should not be that someone.
There is no-one on the current B Team, with the possible exception of Gunji Riko, who could take that place. But then again, Gunji lost to Takahashi Asuka at the All Japan Championships last December, ... in straight games. We may need to look at the layer beneath, i.e., current/recently graduated university and high school students. Keep an eye out for Kurihara Akari; Okuhara needed three games to beat her at the AJC
Asuka Takahashi has good qualities . It is too shallow to say that it is just her problem. To me, it might be a coaching problem. A good coach can bring out her potentials and , work on improving what she needs to improve and strengthen her strong points. If coaching is not the problem then i would say it could be a heart problem. hard to play when your heart is not convinced that you belong there, playing for your country on international level. Then this is where the coach can do something to encourage her. Most of points she lost is through her own unforced errors. Many points she won is not because of opponent unforced errors but because of her good attacking skills. Sometimes, I see Akane Yamaguchi doing this as well (many many unforced errors) when she wants to quickly finish the game and take a rest. Then, in the next tournament, she suddenly becomes highly motivated and wins everything.
I don't think it's quite accurate to compare Takahashi Asuka's unforced errors to Yamaguchi's unforced errors. Yamaguchi does have moments where she loses concentration and then give away easy points, but she does win the matches that she's expected to win most of the time. After watching her last two matches, Takahashi's unforced errors are either due to her lack of belief or lack of fighting spirit, maybe due to her feeling of insecurity about her place on the national team, as you've suggested. It's competitive at the Team A level. If she can't convince herself that she belongs there, and play like she belongs there, then there's always somebody else right below her who is more than eager to take her place. You could say the same thing about Ohori. Ohori does have good skills, but she gives up easily when things doesn't go her way and doesn't have the fighting spirit necessary to regularly win matches, hence, she is where she is today. Takahashi's immediate goal should be to get into the top 32, but if she keeps losing matches that she needs to win, like in the last two tournaments, then we might as well forget that the 4th spot on Team A exists for the rest of the year.
A special event for Endo, Kamura, and Sonoda's retirement is being streamed live on Watanabe Yuta's YouTube channel right now.
Apparently, this exhibition match was 'produced' by Watanabe Yuta, partially because COVID-19 stymied any attempts to have Endo, Kamura/Sonoda play any public retirement matches. In this respect, Yuta is probably the most creative player in the team; and he certainly has leadership skills.
'Bird Japan' is heavily geared towards preparation for the next Olympics. International tournaments, except maybe the WC and AE, are simply milestones and performance markers along the way; basically, players are required to set their sights on the Olympics. And in doubles, the pair, in unison, need to retain that motivation to slog forward. As far as Kamura/Sonoda are concerned, I think that only one of the players was prepared to do this. Sonoda, incidentally, is still with Tonami, doubling up as both coach and player.
The Thomas/Uber delegation has been decided as follows: 1. Thomas Cup: Momota Kento (NTT-East) Tsuneyama Kanta (Tonami) Nishimoto Kenta (JTEKT) Naraoka Kodai (IMG) Hoki/Kobayashi (Tonami) Koga/Saito (NTT-East) Takeuchi/Matsui (Hitachi Engineering) Watanabe Yuta (BIPROGY) 2. Uber Cup: Yamaguchi Akane (Saishunkan) Okuhara Nozomi (Taiyo Holdings) Takahashi Sayaka (BIPROGY) Gunji Riko (Saishunkan) Fukushima/Hirota (Marusugi) Matsumoto/Nagahara (Hokuto Bank) Shida/Matsuyama (Saishunkan) Matsutomo Misaki (BIPROGY)
