http://sports.qq.com/a/20161120/018335.htm
Just briefly, the main points of what Li Yongbo commented:
1) After the retirements of Zhao Yunlei, Wang Yihan, Wang Shixian, Tian Qing, Ma Jin , and Yu Yang, Fu Haifeng will also be retiring (and of course, Wang Zhengming whom he forgot to mention);
2) Li Yongbo revealed that during the pre-Rio Olympic closed-door systematic training, Shi Yuqi already demonstrated he could beat Lin Dan a few times, likewise Chen Qingchen/Jia Yifan beat Tang Yuanting/ Yu Yang, and Zheng Siwei/Chen Qingchen defeated Zhang Nan/Zhao Yunlei which partly explains why post-Rio some of these older athletes chose retirement knowing they couldn't cope with the younger teammates as well as give these youngsters more opportunities;
3) Though the younger cohort have performed remarkably in recent tournaments , it cannot be regarded as extremely good, somewhat accidental in their achievements,and he is of the opinion that they are still relatively young, short of experience, not at all stable, and still needs time to mature;
4) Among the young batch of MS, he spoke approvingly of Qiao Bin, Tian Houwei, Shi Yuqi, Guo Kai, and Xue Song , but singled out Shi Yuqi as the most outstanding, a future top player;
5) On Chen Long, LYB revealed he will carry on till Tokyo 2020 Olympics, adding recently after taking a post-OG break , Chen Long has resumed training, He also said Chen Long is rather reserved by nature, very ambitious in his profession, and in order to better train and prepare himself, he has decided to skip the following Hong Kong Open and the year-end Dubai Superseries Finals so as to come back stronger and in better form next year.
(He also touched on how hard it is nowadays to become a coach for those who might be interested though so far among the retired none have expressed interest as the requirements are more stringent, etc, which I shan't go into).