Game and skills analysis Konstantinos Angelakis (Greece):

The following observations are of course my personal view and do not claim to be the “truth”!

Here comes Konstantinos Angelakis (Greece):

 

Strengths:

• good footwork
• good mixture of attacking and defending on forehand
• nice twiddling of the bat when it makes sense
• good variety of serves
• good forehand topspin on pushes

Weaknesses:

• forehand defense goes up too high too often due to rather “shoveling” technique instead of chopping technique
• placement of backhand defense could more precise according to position of opponent. Should place ball more often to extreme angles to make player have to move left and right all the time to further exhaust him
• Backhand defense seems not choppy enough to me.  I would guess there is a material issue here.
• forehand countertopspin too inconsistent due to taking the ball too early/too high.

Suggestions:

• should practise placement of defense ball into extrem angles.
• Should consider changing to  more dangerous pimples
• Should consider counterspinning with forehand from a lower position and with more sidespin. This is more dangerous and gives you more time both when taking on this ball and the next one
• should absolutely practice chopping on forehand rather than shoveling. Could also try to chop and float the ball back alternatively (a very effective weapon even against better players)

Game and skills analysis Gustavo YOKOTA (Brazil):

The following observations are of course my personal view and do not claim to be the “truth”!

Here comes Gustavo YOKOTA (Brazil):

 

 

 

Strengths:

• very good footwork
• nice backhand defending with heavy chop with pimples
• nice twiddling of the bat using pimples in when pushing the ball into the backhand of opponent
• good and consistent forehand topspin with heavy spin
• good variety of serves

Weaknesses:

• backhand defending on fast topspins could be more consistent , nearly all defending on this goes off the table (not into the net). This is why his long pips rubber seems to fast to me
• push with pimples bounced high quite often. This will be punished by better players as you can see in the third video
• forehand topspin often too slow to win the rally early
• forehand counter topspin too inconsistent, should consider defending more on forehand
• too much attacking only on forehand, never defends on forehand which would occasionally make sense
• often goes back too early from the table
• Serves sometimes bounces too long which is punished by fast topspins from better players.

Suggestions:

• practise short serves
• practise forehand defending especially with long pimples
• try to get into attacking mode with backhand either pushlifting with long pimples or heavy spin with pimples in

Game and skills analysis Sas Lasan (Slovenia)

The following observations are of course my personal view and do not claim to be the “truth”!

Here comes Sas Lasan (Slovenia):

Due to the fact that Lasan apparently is one of the rare defenders that doesn’t use neither short or long pimples nor antispin rubber I would like to mention general advantages and disadvantages of playing with two sides rubber in:

Advantages:

• you can also put loads of back spin when pushing the ball thus preventing fast topspins. Precondition is that you are subtle and agile in your wrist.
• if you are able to topspin with both sides in addition to defending you will become quite versatile and unpredictable for the opponent
• if you are able to you can vary the spin in a very deceptive way mixing heavy chop defense with low floating balls, so that it becomes very difficult for the opponent to read the spin

Disadvantages:

• it is hard to defend slow and very spinny topspins. You have a high likelyness that you put the ball far off the table or return it much too high
• it is hard to give the same backspin back or even increase it on the topspin you received as you can do with good quality long pips rubbers
• when playing weaker players you give away the advantage of confusing the opponent about your own spin when twiddling while pushing back the ball
• When using pimples in to defend (same as for short pips) you have to be much faster on your feet in order to be able to return the ball low and on the table.

I just realized that he is using long pips here!

 

Strengths:

• good physical fitness with a long “reach” for a defender
• quite versatile being able to attack and defend on both sides
• good backhand topspin
• good variety of serves

Weaknesses:

• main weakness is inconsistent defending from his backhand especially when getting fast topspins
• forehand topspin consistent but not a “killer”
• physically strong but not very agile/flexible

Suggestions:

• should consider changing to pimples on backhand plus practise twiddling to still have the same options as before for attacking (oops I just saw in the second video that he did change to long pips!)
• should work on getting away from “shoveling” technique on forehand defending (when using pips out) towards chopping through the ball

Game and skills analysis Kentaro Miuchi (Japan)

The following observations are of course my personal view and do not claim to be the “truth”!

Here comes Kentaro Miuchi (Japan):

 

Strengths:

• very good footwork
• nice twiddling of the bat
• good backhand topspin with pimples in
• good forehand topspin against push
• good forehand serves
• nice defending with long pimples on forehand when needed
• good and very consistent forehand counter topspin

Weaknesses:

• problems returning tricky serves, often giving the ball back too high
• is going back from the table too early thus being forced to push short pushes back to high with too low spin
• has problems winning the rally when confronted with “balloon”-defense (long high balls from far away off the table)
• forehand push ball doesn’t have enough chop/backspin
• counter topspin from behind the table sometimes too slow to cause problems for the attacker
• Forehand block from midrange too slow to put opponent into trouble

Suggestions:

• should work on return on serves and pushing forehand with heavier chop to prevent attacker from getting in too easily with hammer topspin
• should use pimples in more often to chop fast and heavy down the backhand of opponent when confronted with pushes down his backhand
• should work on faster counter topspins from far behind the table (as Joo Sae Hyuk does) or with much more side spin (as Hou Yingchao does)
• should practise “killing” the ball when confronted with high “loops”