What I don't understand is although he's been faulted quite frequently for his serve, he's still going on his tiptoes to serve. While that would be an advantage under the old rules, surely that would result in more faults under the new rules
Out of habit perhaps? Or that's how he could serve as precise and as tight as possible? What I could see from his matches is that he no longer had the advantages when he served (as he used to with the old rules especially when the game got really tight at the end) and he seemed to be bothered by it (both in MD and XD).
ZN is no longer play in XD? No ZN name in XD at German Open and All England. The same goes to Li Yinhui. Maybe the CHN coaches think it's better to focus in MD and let XD has Lu Kai/Chen Lu along with He JT/Du Yue to accompany Zheng SW/Huang YQ and Wang YY/Huang DP.
LYH has no talent at the net lol. No speed, no prediction. ZN also has a weak smash and limited energy when he can run fast. ...and the only thing there is to compensate for all that is his insane IQ and/or skills. Even legends can't overcome that. These weaknesses are not as major in MD, as he's playing the net and the opponents are so scared of his flat game they don't hit to him anyway.
If that's true good to see that ZN can finally focus in MD only and that means they are getting serious with the Olympics qualification is very near. I guess no new partner for ZN. Could only pray LC does his part much better from now on. Though initially they paired ZN with LYH for the sake of her improving her net play still he made up a lot for what she obviously lacking or has none. ZN basically did almost everything in that partnership. Play maker, work from the back and sometimes he had to work at the net too. No way he could do double duties if he had to do too much work.
I have checked both German Open and All England players list and I didn't see Zhang Nan in the XD list. So I guess this means they are finally getting serious (whatever that means) with this MD partnership. Their target would probably qualifying for the Olympics next year and winning Sudirman Cup this year(?). I wonder who will be assigned as part of the SC team as I thought I saw CHN had Han/Zhou and He/Tan were in the team they sent to Tom Yum Kai Cup in HK. This means the probability of Liu/Zhang as the MD beside Li/Liu is pretty high. And I hope they could win at least one title this year.
There is something interesting in the German Open MD draw : https://www.tournamentsoftware.com/sport/draw.aspx?id=444F7F0E-65BC-4F1E-A602-08ED7B5962A4&draw=6 Liu/Zhang will face Hoki/Kobayashi in R1. They are in the first quarter with : Ko/Shin who are playing Kim/Lee in R1, and the winner of this round will face Kamura/Sonoda in R2. If Liu/Zhang got through R1, R2 safely they will face one of the 3 pairs above. Since Ko/Shin were in the same team with ZN in CBSL, it will be interesting to see them playing each other or any other pair actually.
Agree ~ it is interesting to follow German open too 2018 German Open MD won by Inoue/Kaneko ~ this year have LYD/KGJ participate and only 1 INA MD from Qualification stage Liu/Zhang vs Hoki/Kobayashi --> H2H is 2-1 --> Liu/Zhang have chance to advance...... Let's see how Inoue/Kaneko fare in 2019
To be drawn to play against minions in R1 All England.. What's the first tournament to be counted in the Olympics qualification this year?
Swiss Open 2019 draw is out. Liu/Zhang will be in the same half with Kim/Lee, Li/Liu and Ahsan/Hendra.
Just checked the draw, most of INA MD pair take part except minions Edit: someone going to comment what i wrote above supposed to be in which thread lol
Liu/Zhang lost in R2 to Kim/Seo in 3 games. They also had a hard time winning their match against Hoki/Koba in R1. Had to win it in 3 games and narrowly. There were no streaming available for their matches, hard to say how they did or what went wrong. But didn't look that good. Hopefully we can see them in action next tournament (against minions in AE)
Blindly guessing, I'll say that LC was probably a liability in the flat game and made too many errors, especially above the net...
Yeah I saw the pictures. Looked pretty bad, especially when they have to play against minions. Any news on it? Can't believe they have to be so "lucky" to be drawn to face minions of all other seeded and unseeded pairs in AE.
Let's hope that Liu/Zhang don't get thrashed badly against minions. Though I don't know if minions will start in full gear or not.
