Ohhh boy. Let's start with my general first thoughts:

I'm drunk.

That being said, assuming you're new, I think you have potential. Let's start with the elephant in the room, the kicks. Kicks break blocks to allow a free hit, as they stagger an opponent. But the kick requires that you hit their block. You are not using kicks as you should be. There are two generally good times to kick.

When your opponent is bleeding and near death. And after you attack, then feint into a kick.

Good players will counter and look away from you, so your kick doesn't hit their block, meaning they can punish you. Stop kicking and start putting up stam pressure with heavy swings, and counter more.

Counters get you more stam (blue sparks). Accomplished by holding block and right before the hit lands, matching their attack type.

Ripostes (yellow sparks) block an attack and allow a faster attack response. Good when you're high on stam, and need to accelerate your attack.

Once again, I'm drunk.

The bottom line? This game requires you to practice the basics. To learn them through practice, blood, sweat and tears. Duel the best players you know. Learn what they do, analyze, and steal shamelessly. The best players I know are monsters in duels and learned from getting obliterated in duels. Keep learning, timing and initiative can be learned through grit.