1st round loss, episode 2!

Hi,

First of all I want to apologise for not updating my blog the last few days. I'll do my best to assure this won't happen again :)
Just like in Austria I lost my first match of the tournament here in Germany. I played my good friend Joachim Persson and lost 21-19 21-10. The first set was not too bad, but still my offence wasn't working very well. I actually think it was a bit worse this time compared to my game in Austria. This is really where I need to put my main focus the next few weeks! Fortunately there is also a few positive things to take from the game. My defence worked well again and I felt like my movement was a bit better than in Austria. So this was still a small step in the right direction! But I must admit it's frustrating to lose even though I know I'm still in the proces of recovering from my injury!! Hopefully this period will soon come to an end!

Talk to you guys soon,

HK

1st round loss...

Hi all,

As you may know by now I lost my first round match against englishman Aamir Ghaffar. I started off quite well and took an early lead, but I couldn't keep it up so I ended up losing the first set 21-13. The 2nd set was much alike the 1st. I flew off to a 5-0 start, but then he began to closer down the gap and he took a lead at 17-16. This time however, I managed to keep my cool and closed the set 22-20 on my 2nd setpoint. The third set was the complete opposite... Now Aamir was the one who got a good start and unfortunately I weren't able to catch up with him, so I ended up losing 21-17.
Even though I lost I'm happy about some parts of my game in this tournament. My attacking game still wasn't as good as it used to be, but I kept on trying to use it and play fast. It did cost me more than a few mistakes and also really made me feel tired. But this is exactly what I need to do to get back to where I want to be! I'm also happy about how my defence worked throughout the match. That's one thing that can definetly boost my confidence a bit. It's nice to feel I can rely some on my defence when my offence is obviously not working to it's full strenght yet!

I'll leave Vienna tonight, my flight takes off at 19.45, so now I've really got some time to kill! I won't stay home for long though as I'm going to German Open on tuesday. I was meant to play in the qualification rounds, but I got promoted into the main draw a few days ago. The sad thing about this is that I now have to play one of my very best friends, Joachim Persson (seeded 11 WR 29), in the first round. First of all that's a tough draw and secondly I'm not happy about the fact one of us has to leave this tournament at such an early stage. Nothing we can do about it and of course we both want to win. Anyway, I'm still looking forward to playing and continue working on getting my game back to a higher level!

Thanks for your interest,

HK

Austria International

Hi all,

I arrived sound and safely in Vienna yesterday about noon. I'm staying at a nice hotel and the hall we're playing in seems to be good as well. I went there to do some light training with some of the swedish players which was fine. Tonight I will have a session with austrian no. 1 and home-favourite Jürgen Koch. My back hurts me a little, but I don't think it's too bad. I'm sure it won't affect my game here in Austria. I am meant to a qualifier at 10 tomorrow morning, it will probably be Aamir Ghaffar from England or a guy called Endra Kurniawan who's originally from Indonesia, but now represents Germany. No matter who it will be I will just have to focus on my own game. I'll do my very best to try and get back to the game I played before I got injured. A fast and attacking game. This has been really difficult for me during the team matches I have played both for my club in the danish league and for my country in the european championships. I think its mainly down to the fact that my confidence is low at the moment, so I feel a bit insecure every time I hit an attacking shot. So I will have to force myself to keep on attacking and play fast, even though I may not be able to do this with much succes right now. This is the only way for me to get back to the game I want to play (and have to play to suceed at a higher level). So for this tournament the result is not what's important, but I would still love to win :)

I will keep you posted on how I get on, but for the 2nd straight week the connection to the internet at my hotel is not very good...

Thanks,

HK

European champion!

Just a quick note to let you all know that along with the rest of the danish team I won the Men's Team European Championships yesterday, beating England 3-0 in the final. My first senior european gold medal, but hopefully not the last :) The danish girls also won their competition, so now we are all going to the Thomas/Uber Cup finals in Jakarta in may. Given we are being selected for the team again of course!
After a very quick prize ceremony and a crazy chase in our rented mini-vans (and a lot of help from the airline company) we made it to our scheduled plane and I arrived back home at around 10 in the evening yesterday and today I have to play a league match for my club Greve. We have to go to Århus which a few hours of driving from where I live and since the match is to start at 8 tonight, I'll be back home quite late... So this is going to be some very stressful days, as I'm going to Austria International tomorrow morning at 10! I'm sure it will all be fine though!

Hopefully the internetconnection in Austria is a bit better than the one we had in Holland, so I can keep you all posted on how I progress.

A last little note, check out badzine.info, they have a really nice article up on me: http://www.badzine.info/content/view/846/. It's a great article so please have a look :)

/HK

Dissapointment!

Last night we played Scotland in the final match of the gropu stage. We won the match 4-1 with my singles being the only one we lost :( We were leading 4-0 in the tie when I had to play, so luckily it didn't really mean anything for the team. Nonetheless it was a great dissapointment for me to lose. My opponent, Gordon Thomson, fought hard and played well, but I'm very dissapointed about my own standard of play. I know I have been out of competitve badminton for a long time and of course it takes time to get back at the same leve as before. But I really thought I was much further in my progress than what I showed last night. There were moments that was good and a had a big lead in the 2nd set, but I still didn't manage to hold on and force the decider. I made some really stupid choices, especially from the front of the court where I really doubted my own skills. Generally I felt quite insecure throughout the whole match, my confidence is not what it used to be. I will have to work on getting this back as it is essential for me to believe 100% in everything I do on court. I'll get a few chances the next few weeks when I have to play an international series tournament in Austria and a grand prix in Germany. I don't think I'll get the chance to play any more matches in this Thomas Cup, which is fair enough! All I can do now is to cheer for my teammates and hope that we bring home the gold as I think we should with our current team! Right now I'm actually in the hall rooting for the danish ladies team to beat Russia, they are currently up 2-0 in their quarter final encounter against Russia. So things are really looking good.
The mens team will play Sweden in the quarter final later today, which shouldn't cause us too much trouble now that Peter Gade and Kenneth Jonassen has joined the team!
I'm off now to watch the rest of the Denmark-Russia match and then do a little training with my good friend and teammate Jan Ø. Jørgensen.

All the best,

HK

Undefeated!

Hi all,

Sorry for not updating my blog earlier, but the internet connection at our hotel is the worst ever!
I had my debut on the national team on tuesday evening, playing against Israel. I was to play 3rd mens singles and 1st doubles with Mathias Boe as his regular partner Carsten Mogensen hurt his back a little in the morning. I'm haven't played doubles for ages, so was a bit funny to suddenly get a chance to play on the national squad! Luckily I won both of my matches without breaking too much sweat! I won my singles in only 15 minutes, 21-7 21-6. My doubles lasted a bit longer, having to use 20 minutes and a scoreline of 21-10 21-16. We won the team match 5-0, so it was a nice start to the tournament and a really good debut for me.
Yesterday we didn't have to play, so we did some training for a good hour or so and watched the danish girls play their 2nd group of the tournament. A match they won 5-0 against Belarus.
Tonight we will play Scotland and this time I will only play singles! It will be a tougher challenge than playing Israel as Scotland beat them 4-1 yesterday. So I really look forward to playing a match with a little more intensity.

Follow the scores here (livescore in top right corner, we play at 18.00): http://www.tournamentsoftware.com/sport/matches.aspx?id=18141&y=2008&m=2&d=14

That's it for now,

HK

Leaving for Thomas Cup/European Championships

Hi,

It's been a few days since my last update due to the lack of spare time I've had lately! I've been working very hard on getting ready for Thomas Cup Qualifiers/European Mens Team Championships. We leave tomorrow afternoon and play our first match on tuesday against Israel, where I'm set to make my debut for the national team :-) To represent my country at the highest level is a dream comming true and obviously I'm very excited about it. I feel ready for this task even though I've had a little trouble with my back the last few days. It's nothing serious, but has just annoyed me for the last 2 trainings I've had. Not to worry though, it's getting better and I'm sure it won't affect me on tuesday! I'll be high on andrenaline so won't be able to feel any pain whatsoever! =)

In my last blogpost I told you all about how close to a place in the final my team Greve got after we won our league match. BS København did their job and beat Aarhus (coached by legend Morten Frost) 4-2, which means we are now in the final against BS København!! We still have to play 1 more playoff game before the final, but the outcome of this match cant change the fact that it will be Greve vs. BS København in the final. The final will be a 2-legged final, where we play 1 match at home and 1 match in BS København. The team that finishes first in the playoffs will hold the home-advantage in the 2nd final. The finals are being played on the 19th and 27th of march. Usually it's a very intense match with loads of spectators and live TV coverage, so this will be anoter huge badmintonmoment for me as this is also a first time experience! Most of my teammates have all tried it before, so hopefully they can pass on some of their experience :)

I have to go now, have some coaching to do for a group of younger players. I'll try and update this blog during Thomas Cup, but not sure if we have internet connection on the hotel. If not, you can all follow my progress here: http://www.tournamentsoftware.com/sport/teammatches.aspx?id=18141&tid=1

Hope all of you are enjoying your weekend so far,

HK

What a way to get back at it!

Hi all,

I won my match last night and so did the team. We beat the 4th ranked team in the league with a score of 4-2 which means we are now very close of a spot in the final. If the match tonight between the league leaders and no. 3's turns out in favor of the leaders (as everyone predict) we will be ensured a place in the final against this team, no matter the outcome of our last league match. So keep your fingers crossed and root for BS København to beat Team Aarhus tonight!:-)

Back to my game, I had a decent game were I won with the score of 21-15 21-19. Not the best I've ever played, but no wonder after 4 months with no competitive action! I started off a bit slow, but soon got the feeling of it and went into the break 11-9 up. After a little chat with my teammate and coach, Kenneth Jonassen, I quickly build on my advantage and took a 17-11 and 20-12 lead. He saved the first 3 setpoints, but I finally managed to wrap it up 21-15.
In the 2nd set I had a very poor start comitting lots of unforced errors, especially my attacking game was lacking in precision. It made me lose a bit of my confidence and he was suddenly up 7-3. But I got myself together, played it more safe and made him work harder for his points. The effect of my new tactics was pretty obvious as I got back in front at 10-9. I kept control of the match with a 17-13 lead, but a few easy mistakes from my side and a good fighting spirit from my opponent allowed him to tie it up at 17 all. Again I regained my focus and played a few good points were I pushed him around the court which gave me 2 matchpoints at 20-18. He saved the first, but I hit a beautiful smash right down the line on the next one and the celebration could begin!

It really meant a lot to both me, my teamates and the club to win this one as the guy who took over for me during my period of injury, didn't live up to expectations and lost a few close matches. It has been costly for the team as we lost a few points in the league, so it was really nice to show everyone that I'm back and we can now again rely on winning the very important 2nd mens singles.

Still 1 thing is more important than everything I mentioned above: I didn't have any pain whatsoever in my knee during the match. Nothing to report today either, even though the rest of my body is a bit sore. It's hard, but fun, to get back on court!

Hope you are all keeping well,

HK

Danish nationals...

The danish nationals is being played this week, but ufortunately without my participation. 3 weeks of training after a 4 month break isn't enough for me to feel completely fit for playing a tournament. I'm sure I can play 1 or 2 matches, but not sure how my knee will react if I was to play more matches. So I decided it was best to skip this event and focus my training on being ready for the teammatch on monday and then Thomas Cup on the 12th this month.
Due to the nationals many of the players I usually train with is not around, actually Peter Gade is the only one I can train with right now. Not too bad when it's him though :-) I did some training for 1½ hours with him on thursday, which was a very good session. Later in the day I had a massage and then went on to do my strenght training. Yesterday I took the day off as my body felt tired and I knew the next few days will be very hard for me, so I could do with a little break.
Today I'm going to train with a chinese coach called Lian. He works at the national training center and has a tremendous knowledge on footwork and technical training. He is an amazing a coach so I really look forward to this session with him. Peter Gade was supposed to join us, but he had to cancel just a few minutes ago. After the training session I will be watching the danish nationals on TV. Will be interesting to see how my friends and sparring partners get on.
Tomorrow I'll have a very hard training with former world champion Peter Rasmussen, former world no. 3 Anders Boesen and former danish international Niels-Christian Kaldau! Not a bad crew is it?!? :-) They all still play in the danish badmintonleague so they are still playing at a very decent level. I will for sure have my work cut out playing with these guys!! It's good that I have the possibility to train with such high-quality players now that everyone else is playing the nationals. I'm positive playing with these guys will make me feel ready for the teammatch on monday evening, which by the way will be live on danish television. I will get on here and post a lttle about how my first competitive match since 31st of september(!) went on as quickly as I can...

Thats all for now,

HK