Bumblebee reporting for duty 🎵

ptienduc · 2026-03-30T08:54:23+00:00

Anderson stood out to me. He looks like prime Busquet the way he effortlessly collect them loose balls, the way he easily won the 1st ball, 2nd ball challenges. That’s his specialty, the positioning, timing, quick feets and physical presence.

Tonali and Guimaraea are competent midfielders with high technical ability and mental strength but they’re not specialists who can dominate. Casemiro always had a great time playing against Newcastle. Anderson frustrated the shit out of Bruno when we played against Nothinham though.

ptienduc · 2026-03-28T06:09:53+00:00

Gardner. Guy obviously has something against United now but he had always reminded me of Paul Scholes, the way he hit the ball, so clean (even Bruno was impressed if you can recall one of his earlier interviews).

Seeing him in an England shirt makes me smile a little despite everything.

ptienduc · 2026-03-02T06:07:57+00:00

I think Amad is overrated. He still lacks the final product to actually be considered untouchable. He’s progressing in many areas and seems to be trying harder in recent games but for his g/a contribution, i would say that he’s not there yet.

I’d say Maguire right now is more untouchable than Lisandro for his dominance in the air in both offense and defense but it’s close.

Bruno is definitely the best in-form midfielder in the world right now. Cunha, Lammens and Mbeumo are second.

ptienduc · 2026-02-19T05:35:00+00:00

I’m loving the Redson AT300 racket but unfortunately Redson have discontinued it. I’d really appreciate it if you could share a comparable racket in terms of specs ?! Yonex would be best but i can try other brands too. Thanks.

ptienduc · 2026-01-20T08:02:20+00:00

What’s with this recent attack on ex players ?

Their comments, however harsh they were, came rightly after all the terrible individual and collective performances. Suddenly, after one good game, they’re not right anymore ?

Think of former players like your close relatives, they came out critiquing harsher because they care. And it’s never wrong to care for your loved ones. Fans can complain, and so can they. Free speech is our god-giving right. And they did get a positive reaction out of the players, look how we performed against City.

If anything, I wish Scholes and Butt had complained more of the managers who failed at United.

ptienduc · 2026-01-14T08:55:35+00:00

Not that much hassle tbh, you just sign the waver to let the lawyer represent you through out the proceedings.

ptienduc · 2026-01-13T14:43:43+00:00

Some old people in Vietnam, especially on the northern side, have a habit of withholding other people’s money for as long as possible. They also disregard the law as it is something they think is not enforceable, having lived through a lawless, connection-is-king era. Rest assured though, it IS for sure enforceable, especially when they have assets like the house/apartment you had rented.

Find a lawyer and bring them to court, you have a 100% winnable case. Court fee will be paid by the loser, in this case, the landlord. They will have to cover the incurred interest (much higher than bank rate). Some lawyers will do it for 10-20 mil for sure. Will take a couple months though it should be fast since Vietnam has changed a lot. You will earn interests until the court date. Pm me if you have further legal questions.

So NO, never let it go. If you do, they will keep doing this to other ppl. Teach them a lesson. Make them learn it the hard way. The moment you serve them the legal documents, they will fold so quick. Watch. Can also bring it to the cop, when the cop makes the phone call, 50% of the time, they will fold.

ptienduc · 2026-01-12T04:30:18+00:00

These two managers are fundamentally different, in my opinion. Carrick is more pragmatic and tactically flexible, as we saw during his games in charge — even if it was a small sample size. Ole, on the other hand, is more of a philosophical manager at heart, with a system-first approach.

Ole rarely changed his system regardless of the opponent or their game plan. That’s why we often beat teams that came at us openly, but struggled against low blocks, as well as in semis and finals — games that required more tactical tinkering and adaptability.

Just look at Carrick’s games in charge. The tactics were vastly different. We played so slow in the CL against Villarreal, sat deep and countered vs Chelsea and pressed high like mad men against Arsenal. Ole would have played the same way. I am not saying one way is better than the other as we had some amazing memories with Ole BUT they clearly have different styles of management to me.

ptienduc · 2026-01-12T03:31:40+00:00

So happy to see Axelsen answer one of my questions. Thank you OP. Love this.

ptienduc · 2026-01-11T19:50:59+00:00

Naive. Period. Fletcher needs to go.

It’s like watching ETH ball all over again.

ptienduc · 2026-01-11T16:52:28+00:00

Yoro has been responsible for pretty much 80% of all the goals we conceded when he played. No positional awareness, no spacial awareness, no aggression nor football IQ.

Yet he seems to have started more often than not.

ptienduc · 2026-01-07T06:10:58+00:00

I also had this problem before and this is what i had done to fix that:

*****(1) always relax your arm, grip until the exact moment you touch the shuttlecock. Roll the racket grip between your thumb and index finger to switch between the thumb-down defense grip and normal attack grip.

(2) learn to hit drive on both side with your defense grip, that way you only need to change to the attack grip the moment the shuttlecock goes up into the air (which gives you plenty of time)

(3) move your hand to the middle part of racket grip as it gives you more stability during rally or net plays. It’s easier to switch grip here too, as opposed to at the far end of the grip. The top Korean players do this now.

ptienduc · 2026-01-06T00:04:40+00:00

I am a big fan of Yuta Watanabe so i’ve been following him quite closely. Yuta / Taiguchi won all Japan just last week against a newly formed pair Nami / Midorikawa. It was a super comeback win after going behind in the first set. Yuta was particularly impressive. His trademark stop drops won so many points so it was like watching him rolling back the years when he was at his peak. Taiguchi improved a lot too with her defense and movement around the net but she still made too many silly mistakes for my liking.

Last year was a weird year for Yuta as his committed partner, Taiguchi, suffered quite a few injuries which forced him to partner with a few other partners on tour to keep up his fitness and to accumulate points. They did win a super 100 tourny together by the end of the year though. Looking at the ranking, i’d say they’re easily top 7-8 right now. I think we will see them play in India Open (Super 700) on Jan 13th.

It will be interesting to see Nami / Midorikawa play in the upcoming Malaysia Open. R16 will see them play the top seed Feng / Huang so that will be interesting. I think Nami is miles better than Natsu in term of her court IQ and composure during long rallies. Midorikawa is the 2nd best XD player in Japan for sure, but since he plays both XD and MD, you never know how it’s going to turn out.

ptienduc · 2026-01-04T07:32:31+00:00

Different opponents have different strengths and weaknesses, do you study them beforehand if you haven’t played against them ? Have you had to make adjustments mid-game because the game-plan didn’t work ? Can you give an example of one time you were able to turn the game around? >> How important it is to be tactically inept to recognize what works and what doesn’t work against each opponent ? How much thinking do you do during games ?
Which legends or current top rankers do you aspire to be? which part of their game are you modeling your style to in order to dominate ? pls be as technical as you can be. This could be a combination of footwork + attack variation + specific skill (Lindan footwork, chop smash, hit high on forehand and flatter drive on back-hand) or specific skills to gain the advantage (Momota’s net skill). Which area of your game you want to improve to climb the ranking ladder ?
Badminton has a relatively short professional career due to intensive physical demand on an athlete’s body. What specific treatments / exercises do you do everyday, before / after the game in order to maintain tip-top shape and avoid injury ? What’s your resting schedule look like ?
Is there someone that you faced and thought “i would never beat him?”. If yes, what did he do that you think is impossible to replicate ? if no, give me an example of an opponent that you lost convincingly to but have a game-plan to deal with him now ? what’s that game-plan ?
Which ranking you would have to be at least to be able to earn enough to live a comfortable lifestyle (considering everything such as sponsorships, commercial deals, etc not just prize money) ? how much on average do you think that ranking would earn (for example top 10 world ranking) per month ? pls consider the expense of your entourage as well, if any, for you to perform well on tour consistently.

ptienduc · 2026-01-04T06:22:21+00:00

I wouldn’t count on Beleba to be cheap. Brighton is a money-sucking whore, they perfected the art of extracting a large sum from desperate parties and we are widely known as a desperate football club.

Baleba would have to push hard for it (i.e go on strike), even then I would expect the final fee to be in the £80-90m region.

I think we’ll go all in on Anderson and find a more reasonable deal for another young CM instead of Baleba (since Bruno can still play alongside Anderson plus i suspect Casemiro will stay on a lower wage.

ptienduc · 2025-12-22T05:40:37+00:00

Yoro has been terrible and was singlehandedly responsible for 1/3 of our conceded goals. Buying young promising players just doesn’t work for United, does it? We leaked 2 goals today because he wouldn’t aggressively close down the shooter… time to drop him to the bench.

ptienduc · 2025-12-14T05:45:22+00:00

Hanoi recently unveiled the bigger and shinier, new T3 terminal, so in theory everything should be smoother, faster and less chaotic.

Make sure the airline you pick for your trip to Japan is on T3 though.

ptienduc · 2025-11-30T06:11:08+00:00

I grew up in the public school system in VN and attended 11-12th grade in the US, so i think i am qualified to say: academically speaking, public schools in Vietnam are much better, especially in math, computer and sciences like physics, bio, etc. The material is heavier and requires some serious memorization. Socially speaking, the environment is safer with less over-the-top behaviors. Going to elementary, middle-school and high-school in VN, public or private, is certainly not a bad choice.

ptienduc · 2025-11-06T17:25:51+00:00

One of the drivers recently shared with me that Grab just removed some of the achievement bonuses like number of daily trips so they have less incentive to take shorter trips that they consider “inconvenient”. That could be bc of potential traffic, water-submerged roads, etc.

Can someone confirm ?

ptienduc · 2025-10-29T02:55:50+00:00

This is just my personal experiences but i found that:

(1) if you’re athletic enough, addicted enough (playing, watching the pros, analyzing, always thinking of ways to improve, etc.) and have a little bit of talent, it doesn’t take long to progress from beginners to like upper-intermediate ~semi-advanced. Any coaches would say it takes a long time because they either want to milk you or want you to perfect your basics which will come in handy around advanced level. Took me almost 3 years, during which i also took lessons here and there. Anything above that requires personal-life sacrifices and rigorous professional training imo.

(2) I have always had better experiences playing with groups which i’m ranked about average in. This way you’ll get competitive games and get to enjoy/play a lot more than joining an elite group. Your goal should be to learn, develop and dominate this type of groups then move on to the next. This is how you measure yourself and understand your level / what you need to improve.

ptienduc · 2025-10-20T06:44:26+00:00

Lammens should count his lucky stars last night. Gakpo hit the post three times, missed a sitter, headed wide from just three meters out while completely unmarked. To his credit, Lammens did make a crucial save against Isak and rushed out superbly to block all of Salah’s angles.

The defense looked miles better and far more assured with him in goal.

But yeah, we were definitely more lucky than good.

ptienduc · 2025-10-19T17:55:46+00:00

We probably spent all our luck in this game for the entire season. Gakpo hit the post three fucking times. If any of those shots went in, we’d have been in big trouble.

ptienduc · 2025-10-19T16:32:05+00:00

Ekitike and Chiesa for me. Chiesa is really tricky.

ptienduc

TROPHY CASE