Cai's Diary (Eindhoven)

These were written at the Einhoven Worlds in 1999.

Cai's Dairy (August 6): Wang Liqin

Wang should not have lost to Eloi. Back in June, in the World Club Championships, Wang had beaten Eloi. Dwelling too much on that match had a negative effect on Wang. Eloi, after that loss, had obviously developed a better strategy against Wang, especially on serves. There are 3 reasons why Wang lost: 

1. Last time, most serves were going to Wang's left, and off-table. This time, they were to the right, and few were off-table. Wang was especially bad in receiving Eloi's serves this time; either he directly lost the point, or he gave Eloi easy balls to attack.

2. Wang did not play well when he was ahead. Eloi, once he realized his serves were working, was much more aggressive in returning serves, and with much more variety. He took risks returning serves and in rallies, frequently gaining the upper-hand over Wang. Wang had many weapons that could win points that he was afraid to use in this match; these powerful weapons or techniques are more risky, and he was afraid to take risks.

3. Wang was unable to modify his strategy to cope with the changes on the court. His training was a little too one-dimensional, so his games were a little too "straight". When the opponents operate outside of his normal training targets or boundaries, by, for example, varying the rhythm or shot placements, Wang was unable to quickly adept to these changes.

But the most important reason why Wang lost was because he was carrying a very heavy mental baggage. (He was too afraid to lose, and therefore not willing to take risks, or otherwise play to his full capability.) Under normal circumstances, Wang should have no trouble beating Eloi.


Cai's diary (August 9): Finally Winning The Men's Singles Title

Last night, I just couldn't fall asleep, and only got about three or four hours of rest. Whether we can bring the MS trophy home depends on the two semifinals that Ma and Liu play in.

The first semifinal was the most crucial. When Ma was behind 2 games, I felt that he had a very slim chance. Unexpectedly in the 3rd game Waldner started making mistakes: he relaxed a little, and played conservatively, thinking he had the match won. That gave Ma a chance to attack, and then when Waldner tried to play tight again, things were different. Relatively speaking, Waldner is weaker against penholders, especially when you have steadied the backhand and he cannot use your power. Even if Ma had lost, I felt than Liu can beat Waldner in the final. 

For today, we have been preparing the last two years. After the 44th Worlds, we went back to look at the videotapes, and realized that technically we were slightly behind Waldner, Primorac and Samsonov. During the last 2 years, we focused on technically solving the problem of how to change from defense to offense after receiving serves. Even more importantly, we worked on improving the mental strength of our players. That's why I was confident we could win the MS title. The key is the first 3 days of competition. As long as we did not self-destruct, our chances were very good. Looking back, a lot of our decisions were correct. After winning the Pro-Tour titles in Paris, we skipped all the international tournaments, even though that led to drops in our rankings and resulted in 3 fewer eligible players for the Worlds. But we have maintained our confidence against foreign players, and we played with steadiness even when we faced difficulties in matches. Actually in MS, we had to struggle to win many times, and we only won by a few points. If we had relaxed a little, or were a little weaker in some aspects, we would not have won the MS title.


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