Except Momota would have won if not for the judgement errors. Too many of those. Yesterday he left one and I was surprised af
"Except". What do you mean "except"? If and if an if. If not for a few unforced errors, VA would have won G1. You can always say things like these after a match. It is part of the game to not make errors.
Judgement errors are part of the game because of the pressure. LCW made a lot of these at the baseline against LD too.
If VA beats Momota again in the next one or two encounters, then Momota will cease to be VA's nemesis, the jinx is broken for sure. In future, their future H2H will look more balanced.
But Viktor's attack has no effect on Momota unlike Chen Long at the Olympics, Momota is reading him like A, B, C, D
But Viktor was the absolute favourite to win anyway. Momota is no where near 100% in stamina, shot quality and pace. Yet Momota could have won if he took these shots instead of letting them fall. The way he leave shuttles sometimes is very bizzarre. He doesn't even need to be under pressure even when playing completely cool he would leave these shots.
Viktor has improved from two years ago. I thought he was rather predictable with his attack. Stamina wise he is fitter but lurching mid match is a concern.
Momota's fitness is failing him ... We've seen Momota bringing on a 3 game match to tired his opponent out... but this time round, he is obviously the more tired one ... Perhaps Covid or the accident affected him (Read somewhere that if you contacted Covid and its serious enough, you'll lost some of your lung capacity) Not making excuses for him, its frustrating he is leaving all those "out" points which failed him ... But Victor did good to stay with him. He probably did hurt Momota's confidence by winning the 2nd game
His mental fortitude has improved significantly, I assure you of that. Sent from my M2007J20CG using Tapatalk
That is really debatable. Let's just remind everyone that it is only your very own interpretation of what "people don't want to say". + many forget VA also got covid (yet everyone will react differently, granted), carried an ankle injury from 2018 (surgery on it) to 2019, leading to his withdrawal from the WC 2019 (another surgery? not sure here as I don't really follow VA), and some asthma issues that became rather serious at times (I forgot which ones, but if I recall he missed some tournaments because of this and he is now receiving a treatment). The same way KM is most likely (well I think he is not but I don't really know) not back to his former level, may be VA was not in top form back in 2018/2019. And we can speculate the same way about rival athletes of all generations including LD and LCW. That is sport, peak form comes and goes, for various reasons and accidents or incidents, mental or physical. KM 2018 might beat VA 2021 (or not) but what if LD 2008 beats KM 2018? KM's WC titles would become invalid all of a sudden? For sure not. All of this athlete bashing/favouritism is ridiculous. Let's just give credits when it is due (KM destroyed everyone for 2 years but VA too is killing it right now and that is a fact regardless of the past/future) and leave the rest to the athletes on the actual court.
Which Chen Long ? 2021 CL with a big blood blister? Nah, I've in mind the Chen Long of 2014/15/16 - just ask Lee CW.
Yeah , the one who faced Vicky at the Tokyo Olympics and was repeatedly telling Chen Yu that I am not able to read his attack. But when I watch Momota vs Axelsen, I feel that Nothing Axelsen does troubles momota. You wanna Smash? Return You wanna Smash extra hard? Return finding the net cord and landing in Axelsen's court You wanna Smash even harder and steeper? Momota guesses right. And there was one rally where Momota was dead tired, what did he do? He tossed the shuttle up the heavens at the net and the shuttle tumbled over the net cord and all Axelsen could do was lift 5-6 cm above the net. It's one of the worst rivalries in the history of the sports
2014 Chen Long was pretty much untouchable when his game was on. But 2016 CL was for some weird reason really only good at the Olympics, wasn't he ? It kind of felt like he had played bad for way too long before suddenly going back to 2014 CL and winning it all.
2015 was Chen Long's golden year when he captured like 9/10 titles, including the world championships. You're right about Chen Long's performance in 2016, so-so and then all of a sudden he was sweeping all before him at the Rio'16 Olympics, unstoppable in all departments of the game, except when Son Wan Ho unexpectedly took one set off him but then got busted again the next. That year, 2016 OG, even LCW who was the favourite was forlorn in defeat to CL in the final and conceded his opponent was just too good.