Sun Yu (孙瑜）

Sun Yu vs Ratchanok in the 2014-2015 Chinese Badminton Super League.

[video=youtube;DsNgXJlMILA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsNgXJlMILA[/video]

 

Now that Chen Jin has made known his intention to let Sun Yu as well as Liu Xin to get a shot at the Rio Olympics and not confine CHN WS chances to just the trio of LXR, WYH and WSX, the former two had better do their utmost and seize the golden opportunities to make the most of whatever comes their way. Even if either or both of them ultimately fail to grab one of the two much-coveted Olympic spots, I believe all their effort will not go down in vain but stand them in good stead in future, particularly for the younger 20-yr-old Sun Yu.

For Sun Yu, the opening campaign for the new season is the All England PSS where as luck would have it she is likely to be pitted against Li Xuerui in R2, a high prospect as they are expected to clear their respective R1 opponents Nichaon Jindapon and Zhang Beiwen. So far, Sun Yu has been rather unlucky in being drawn to meet her more established senior compatriots time and again and repeatedly stopped in her tracks from progressing further in the tournaments, hence unable to break into the world's top 10.

To end this vicious circle, Sun Yu has to either start rising to the occasion and overcome her illustrious senior colleagues once in a while to break out of the bind or alternatively play more lower tier tournaments such as GPG/GP and win enough of them to raise her world ranking to top 8 so as to be seeded in different quadrants of the draw in order to avoid meeting her colleagues too often in the early rounds.

Personally, I'd much prefer to see Sun Yu actually rising to pose a serious challenge to all the first-rate players including her seniors than take a sort of short-cut to earn ranking points if she really wants to aim for the Rio Olympics. Otherwise it would be an exercise in futility for her, all her painstaking efforts largely going down the drain and falling short of the ultimate goal in the end. Remember how Li Xuerui catapulted herself to the very top and claimed the crown jewel by dint of sheer immense talent - this is what true champions are made of.

 

Sun Yu's defensive stance is too wide and standing too far behind. A weakness if the opponent drops.

 

Exactly, and she seems to be straining herself lunging forward to the net and bending low to retrieve the opponent's drop-shots, including getting up to return to base position. In the match with Saina, Sun Yu was caught several times, occasionally flat-footed. WYH seems to have the same problem, but less obvious and less of a weakness.

Perhaps, big and tall players are more affected by it but I'm sure it can be overcome by training - just look at Chen Long, how agile and athletic he is.

 

In the two videos featuring Sun Yu's matches above, the one with Intanon shows her playing with more fighting spirit, esp in G3 when 5-11 behind, than as compared with the match against Saina in which Sun Yu was too tentative,overly cautious, more passive, a bit stiff and somewhat tense as if the burden of the pressure of expectations is on her shoulders after all her teammates are out (did Chen Jin expect her to win the tournament, I don't think so, to be realistic).

In Sun Yu's victory over Intanon,I venture to say she didn't outplay the more skillful,highly deceptive and smarter player - it's more of Intanon defeating herself in G3 and accidentally injuring herself at that.

There is one shot I particularly dislike Sun Yu doing, that is the sliced dropshot from the backline in the way she executes it - just too slow , unthreatening,purely defensive, even a weakness as it allows the opponent ample time to get to it with plenty of options. That kind of shot should only be played as a last resort when the shuttle has already went past her,for example, but she does it every now and then, too often, as if deliberately.

I remember it as a bad habit of WSX's which she's since corrected, only doing it when forced to and when the opponent is still near or at the rear of the court, even then rarely. I wish to see Sun Yu turn it into a more disguised and/or sharper dropshot, executing it with an element of deception and giving the opponent less time to react to it.

 

It seems to me Sun Yu is trying to be a thinking player. That itself is a very good thing, commendable, but it comes easier with age and experience unless she happens to be mature beyond her age.

I feel that Sun Yu at 20 years old and early on in her career can afford to take more risks and play more forcefully and aggressively and turn her height and build to maximum advantage while minimizing its disadvantage(s).

Up till now,to me,she doesn't seem very determined and relentless in her fighting spirit but instead appears overly cautious and often tentative, esp when it's her opponent who is pushing her hard and succeeding in exerting pressure on her either with a stronger, fiercer attack or a better, tenacious defence in throwing everything back at her.

At this stage of her career, I'd venture to say it's all right, would even encourage it, for her to go all out, throw caution to the wind, let herself go and in the course of it possibly suffer a couple of hard knocks, learn much from it, and persevere until she emerges stronger in the process. As long as it doesn't break her it will bring out all the latent potential in her.

Only then will we know what she is really made of. I shall wait and see.

 

I think Sun Yu has the ingredients to be amongst the best in the world. Her playing style is similar to Chen Long in that her footwork is firm and steady; and her shots both accurate and deep. However, she lacks the big-match exposure at the moment but that can easilly be attained as time progresses. I think she is still at a "further improvement" stage being only 20 - a stage where Chen Long was at in 2011/2012 before he finally beat LCW for the first time and rose to amongst the top.

Presently, she needs to work on her speed; her defence as well as to cut down on the number of unforced errors. I do find her physique not slender enough like most players but like Chen Long, the trade-off I guess is power.

 

Good point. Comparing to LXR's stance, Sun Yu's is very wide.

 

My worst fear is confirmed, CHN WS is in crisis, and it will remain so for some months at least. WYH has just lost to Busanan at the Swiss Open GPG quarterfinals in a match riddled with amateurish, uncharacteristic errors. Really, it's not simply that she lost but how she played and lost that is worrisome.

This and LXR's recent injury woes couldn't have come at a worst time, what with WSX lacking a game that can threaten the top few attacking players, Liu Xin far from convincing us that she can be a top-notch performer, and the still relatively young, inexperienced Sun Yu only beginning to show promise of becoming one of the CHN elite WS capable of handling the best in the rest of the world.

Without any doubt,once LXR is fully recovered and back to form, she will find herself having to shoulder a heavier responsibility than before to hold aloft the CHN flag victoriously. How I wish Sun Yu can rise to the challenge quickly and fight alongside LXR successfully.

Chen Jin who is into his second year as chief coach will really have his work cut out going forward.

 

Congratulations to Sun Yu for winning the Swiss Open GPG crown with a decisive victory over the in-form Busanan oOngbumrungpan in two straight sets to increase their H2H to 5-0 in her favour without dropping a set. However, throughout the tournament, both Sayaka Sato and Sayaka Takahashi gave her a hard time in the first two sets of their three-set encounters.

I still would like to urge Sun Yu to build up on her speed and fitness for I'm concerned that when she comes up against stubborn,tenacious defenders like Nozomi O, Akanye Y and Kim Hyo Min, who could return practically everything thrown at them, then Sun Yu is likely to tire first and make mistakes.

 

That's why I don't take world rankings too seriously unless all the players compete in the same tournaments and the draw is evenly spread.

As it is, it depends on the number of tournaments played, including which ones, and the luck of the draw, as well as players absent from injury or taking a break.

Take Lin Dan for example, he only played 9 events and he's leapfrogged to WR#3 now whereas, apart from WR1 Chen Long who played 10, WR2 JOJ actually played 15, WR4 K Srikanth 15, WR5 Son Wan Ho and WR6 Viktor Axelsen both 16 each, WR7 Chou Tien Chen played 19 (!) the most , Lee CW relegated to WR8 with remaining 6 events counted, WR9 Hans Kristian Vittinghus played 16, and lastly WR10 Tommy Sugiarto played 11.

As we know, Lin Dan's current World ranking doesn't reflect his true strength, even more so when he was ranked 8 with only 8 events counted the previous week.

However, for technical reasons and despite its limitations, world ranking is necessary to establish eligibility for tournaments, conduct draws, seedings, etc but I would also argue for some degree of flexibility to accommodate special or unusual circumstances for the interests of organizers, sponsors and esp viewers. That's one of the reasons for wild cards, I supposed; we also don't wish to see a draw that's too skewed to one side, it diminishes the elements of competition and excitement building up to and climaxing in the finale.

 

Right,in the decider from 4-11 down to 15-14 up is nothing short of amazing, then at 17-19 behind came that bad linecall that GC claimed Hawk-Eye confirmed it was out though Sun Yu had no more linecall challenges left. So instead of 18-19 where anything was still possible, it became 17-20, three matchpoints down where one mistake and it's all over.

I watched the 3rd set again, thanks to RedShuttle's posting of the video and came away heartened by Sun Yu's performance. Indeed she didn't handle the final few points well which you correctly attributed to her lack of experience. However, I'm more convinced now that she is continuing her upward trajectory, there's improvement every time I saw her play. May Sun Yu grow from strength to strength as soon as possible to rise among the top 3.

 

Sun Yu vs WSX now...

If Sun Yu wins against WSX today, she might have a shot at Rio.