SINGAPORE – The one-month coaching stint with Denmark’s world No. 1 and Olympic champion Viktor Axelsen post-Tokyo 2020 has been broadly credited as an enormous think about Singaporean Loh Kean Yew’s rise to turn out to be world champion.
And the Singapore Badminton Affiliation (SBA) confirmed on Monday (Dec 20) that this profitable formulation is about to be repeated in January, because it plots his path in direction of profitable a medal at Paris 2024.
Axelsen had approached Loh to coach with him in early 2020, across the time when he had pushed the Dane to 3 video games on the Spain Masters’ spherical of 32. However the plan was placed on ice after the one-year postponement of the Olympics as a result of coronavirus pandemic, earlier than materialising in August.
SBA technical director Martin Andrew advised The Straits Occasions: “Kean Yew will journey to coach with Viktor and others in Dubai previous to the tournaments in India in January, and he may additionally return to Dubai after these occasions for an additional couple of weeks.”
Aside from additional enhancing on his recreation play with such high-level sparring on the Nad Al Sheba Sports activities Complicated, the Englishman hopes Loh can emulate Axelsen’s gold commonplace of consistency by way of shot-making and event performances.
Statistics from the Badminton World Federation present that previous to dropping to Loh within the first spherical of the World Championships, 27-year-old Axelsen received 61 out of 64 accomplished matches and clinched 5 titles.
As compared, Loh received 23 out of 30 matches and picked up three titles in his most prolific 12 months thus far.
Andrew mentioned: “Kean Yew’s shot consistency has improved considerably, and we would like him to play with much less errors whereas sustaining the chance degree.
“He has additionally managed to be constant by way of event performances at a excessive degree lately, nevertheless it’s been fairly quick time period and we’ve to anticipate and handle some peaks and troughs with that.
“Viktor has had an awesome run by 2021, and (Kento) Momota had this beforehand by 2019 (when he received a document 11 titles). Kean Yew must be aiming to keep up his degree as a lot as doable, however he’s now enjoying on the high tier of world-class tournaments, so the problem is larger.”
Different targets the SBA has set for the 24-year-old embody profitable medals at subsequent 12 months’s SEA Video games (Could 12-23) and July 28-Aug 8 Commonwealth Video games, in addition to making a powerful push on the Sept 10-25 Asian Video games, whereas persevering with to climb the world rankings.
The SBA will even work with the Singapore Sport Institute on biomechanics and match tagging to grasp extra about his strengths and weaknesses, and improve psychological assist to assist Loh deal with the calls for of touring at a excessive degree.
World No. 22 Loh is anticipated to rise to fifteenth within the new rankings on Tuesday, and Andrew mentioned: “Kean Yew has acquired to intention to get into the highest 10 on the planet subsequent 12 months and preserve that place all through to make sure advantageous seeding at tournaments.
“To take action, he should preserve his bodily situation, which he has completed effectively thus far. We will even work with him on analysing opponents and creating recreation plans in opposition to them, in addition to conserving a give attention to his mentality so he could be robust in difficult conditions.”
