After watching the game, I was thinking, what kind of magic does Axelsen's training camp have that allows the players in it to make such huge progress in a short period of time?
The first point I think is an improvement in confidence. Who could be bigger than an Olympic champion? And is now the most dominant Olympic champion. So even in an important occasion like the All England semi-finals, against Li Zijia, who was in explosive form and defeated Momota yesterday, Lakshya still showed his strength. On the other hand, Li Zijia's condition today was a bit worse than yesterday's match against Momota, and she also made more offensive mistakes. I guess it would be better to beat Momota to make Li Zijia more energetic.
The second point is the improvement of personal abilities. Due to the epidemic, there are very few competitions, so the level of sparring is extremely important. And Lakshya can practice with Axelsen, and his defensive ability will naturally improve. So we can see that Lakshya's defense is even better than Momota, and his stalemate ability is also very good, which must have a lot to do with his usual training. Although Li Zijia also formed his own team, in terms of sparring personnel, it is still not as good as Axelsen's team.
It is precisely because of these two points that the players in Axelsen's training camp are guaranteed to perform well in every game. In this game, Lakshya completely followed Li Zijia's rhythm and put a lot of effort on Li Zijia. Li Zijia's reverse at the last moment seemed to be a mental problem, but in fact it was because his physical strength could no longer support him. Every violent smash looks full of momentum, but it also consumes a huge amount of physical energy. And Lakshya's attack timing is more reasonable, especially the diagonal offensive route is also very threatening, and he is not inferior to Li Zijia. Therefore, when the decisive moment came, Li Zijia was unwilling to take the ball to defend, and was more willing to bet on his offensive touch.
Tonight's All England men's singles final is another civil war at the Dubai training camp. Who is the real sparring partner this time?
