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Diagonal attacks made by Antonsen in the Denmark Open 2024 – Steve’s Badminton Blog and Website


The men’s singles event in the Denmark Open showcased a lot of attacking play. Most of the players who were in the quaterfinals were attacking players in nature. And that led to many fast paced games with players diving all over the place to retrieve smashes. One of the most favoured attacks used by the players was the diagonal smash, which is a cross court smash. Let’s discuss.

In the quarter final’s match between Antonsen and Li Shi Feng, both were launching smashes against each other. Most of the smashes were well defended by both players. They both took good defensive positions and when they had to send the shuttle high, they made sure they sent it all the way back to the baseline at a good height where the opponent could not intercept the shuttle early.

Antonsen sends a smash to Li Shi Feng’s backhand side

The snapshot above shows where Antonsen had to take the smash, which was all the way at the baseline. And Li Shi Feng is right at the centre of the court, which gives him a very good position to reach Antonsen’s smash at any direction. In this rally, Li She Feng returned the smash straight to the net, and Antonsen had to run a huge distance from the baseline to reach it. This is a good defensive play by Li Shi Feng and in the end, he won the rally.

Tactical view of Antonsen’s smash against Li Shi Feng

The tactical view of the smash above shows the positions of both players and also the angle and direction of the smash. Li Shi Feng took a very good position, in the centre slightly to the back. It was clear he was expecting the smash. By standing further back, he had more time to gauge the direction, speed of the smash and where it was landing. When it was clear the smash was landing slightly in front of him to his backhand side, he leapt slightly forward to his backhand side to retrieve the smash. Antonsen taking the smash so far to the rear of the court also meant that by the time the smash reached Li Shi Feng’s backhand side, the shuttle has slowed down tremendously. This made defending the smash much easier for Li Shi Feng.

In final between Antonsen and Koki Watanabe, Antonsen was launching a similar smash, but at different positions. And that match, he had more success. He launched a similar smash at Koki, but was at the 3rd quarter of the court, not all the way at the back. Antonsen managed to intercept the flick by Koki. And as he intercepted the flick early, Koki was not yet back in position in the centre of the court. He was sightly to his forehand side, closer to the front of the court.

Antonsen intercepts Koki’s flick and sends it to Koki’s backhand side

The shuttle was behind Koki almost immediately as Antonsen took it closer to the net, and with Koki also being closer to the net. The shuttle was still flying at a very high speed as it hit the ground. Koki had no chance of getting this smash back.

Tactical view of Antonsen’s smash against Koki

The tactical view makes it clear that Antonsen hit the smash much closer to the net. Koki was also out of position to the left. That means Koki has to cover a lot more ground to reach the shuttle. By intercepting the flick, Antonsen played a winner. Had Koki chose to lift instead of flick, Antonsen would have to the take the smash in a similar position to the smash he took against Li Shi Feng earlier, and Koki would have the time to return to the centre. Then Koki would have no trouble defending the smash. But by intercepting the flick, Antonsen created a situation for him to play a winner.

Diagonal attacks are a common weapon in the arsenal of attacking players. But, it needs to be used with great care. If the opponent were in a good position to defend the shot, like in Li Shi Feng’s case above, then the defender can send the shuttle to the net and make the attacker to run the whole diagonal of the court to retrieve the shuttle.

There are huge tactical drawbacks for the attacker has to make the diagonal run to retrieve the shuttle like that.

The first drawback is within the rally, the attacker loses the initiative, as he has to cover the huge distance, he will likely reach the shuttle late and have to take the shuttle low, which means he is likely going to have to lift. This hands the initiative back to the defender.

The second drawback is for the next few rallies. The attacker would have used up a lot of his energy and stamina to retrieve that shot, and that would mean he has less stamina to launch another attack. If could also mean the attacker get sucked into long energy draining rallies which leave him out of breath, and unable to attack for the next few rallies. This would mean the opponent can take the initiative and attack to get easy points in the next few rallies.

The third drawback is strategic. If the player keeps getting drawn into such exchanges, the player is going to tire out very quickly and will not last the match, especially if the opponent drags him into a rubber game.

Antonsen played a very aggressive tournament where he really went for it. He had the support of the home crowd, which helped him pushed himself. Now with his brother as his coach, he seemed even more pumped up than before. Given his indifferent form over the past year, including that tame performance in the Olympics, he really wanted to change his fortunes. He took a gamble on taking such an aggressive approach to his game. Luckily for him, it worked.

For normal situations, the diagonal attack needs to be used with more caution. It should only be used when the attacker is sure the opponent is not in a position to make him run the full diagonal of the court. Otherwise, better to hit a straight smash. A cross court block resulting from the straight smash is less devastating as the shuttle has to travel a longer distance at a lower speed than at the speed of smash. It gives the attacker more time to react to it, and hopefully, kill the rally and get the point.

That’s all for this entry.

Until the next update, eat well, get plenty of rest, and keep the badminton going!



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