UpSideDownCarl said:
And, I am sorry, fat, out of shape, not training, and with a bad back, and barely able to move, Waldner several times came and played Ma Long in tournaments where you can tell that if he was even in half good shape he would teach Ma Long a serious lesson in tactics and how to play the game.
Then what do you think if Waldner played Zhang Jike? I find this is pretty pointless to even ask you this question 'coz your imagination will go back again to the ZJK's glories and grandslam stuff, then intimately conclude that ZJK can manage the game better. However, Im sorry, who knows? He is probably even worse and just like amateur playing against Waldner.
UpSideDownCarl said:
But if ZJK is goofing around and not trying against guys who he does not even have to try to beat, what does that show. My point with the world cup was that he was not even taking the matches seriously and winning anyway. And then when he played Ma Long who up till the finals LOOKED invincible, but he lost to ZJK who was not playing close to top level and was not even taking the tournament too seriously
You sound like Ma Long wasn't lost in very tightly-intense match, but rather very big gap match... I just take this as you are trying so hard to make your point more convinced, that ZJK is just far better and won the final easily even though he didn't take it seriously. But, sorry, that sounds very funny and bias.
Personally, that match only mean they are very equal at the moment, and Ma Long has significantly improved his mental strength which enables him to launch his powerful forehand counter-loop more confidently, but somehow still the weapon was not fully activated enough yet.
My points are very clear as follows:
1. Even though the discussion on TTD is incredibly helpful in many ways to help me or everyone improving our game, but there should be some limit for making sort of "intimate conclusions", and keep saying those as a trend or concept generally applied throughout every topic on forum. Thats pretty dangerous though.
2. Personally, I would rather learn from the professional coaches or professional athletes who used to be / are commentators for some matches, instead of taking a risk to totally accept those controversial "trends" or "concepts" which, unfortunately, have been made a lot on TTD. Thus some youtube users, such as
JaggedTranslates or
Peko Sukeiras, have made a huge contribution to help many of us, amateur players, understand many aspects of PROFESSIONAL INTERPRETATION FOR THE GAME. If you haven't seen any of these videos, go find them and combine knowledge, with critical thinking of yours, to any concept being said on TTD.
3. As far as I learned from most of the english-translated videos available, I NEVER HEARD any flaw of Ma Long in his SHORT GAME said by those expert analysts. Some of videos even pointed out that top players, of course including Ma Long, have fantastic short game and that help them, a core team members, play well against the secondary team members. On the other hand, Ma Long's nerve has been well told by those experts and that struggle pretty much held him back, but it has drastically improved since we saw the final World Cup recently between Ma Long and Zhang Jike.
4. Lets take a brief critical thinking which I am trying to say in this post:
ML: powerful and fast forehand counterloop, all-round player
ZJK: spinny + speed backhand banana flick, devastating backhand counter, close-table style
Why on earth would ML play more SHORT game to allow ZJK launch his backhand flick to manage his following attack, instead of trying variation and more pushing LONG to ZJK backhand or forehand to open the forehand counter? The same thing happened when ML played FZD on the early day (see video below).
The point is, SHORT GAME is MATTER if you only take it in one way that WH and ZJK trying to make ML trouble in launching his forehand counterloop. But it is NO LONGER MATTER if you think Ma Long, at his mental best, could fully accelerate his variation and long-push to anywhere (elbow, backhand corner, forehand corner) to open his powerful and fast forehand counterloop. And he actually did in the recent world cup final as well.
By the end of the day, it all goes down who is playing at better mood and better game, when everything is equal in techniques and experiences.