In the post-Tine Baun period, Denmark’s women’s singles has become almost synonymous with Mia Blichfeldt and (lately) Line Christophersen, but with a successful Asian tour recently, Line Kjaersfeldt has bounced back into the conversation.
The 28-year-old enjoyed a great spell of form in Indonesia and Denmark, making three straight quarterfinals on the HSBC BWF World Tour for the first time in her career. With wins over Ratchanok Intanon (Indonesia Open) and Carolina Marin (Malaysia Open), Kjaersfeldt showed she can still be a dangerous opponent for the top stars. And with the TotalEnergies BWF World Championships 2022 coming up, the Dane could do some damage to the established names in Tokyo.
“She has improved a lot,” said Marin, after her second round loss to the Dane at the Malaysia Open.
Kjaersfeldt put her results down to the hard work she’d put in and the confidence she gained from each win.
“I’m just working hard every day. I know that Carolina’s just coming back from a really serious injury, so I knew that maybe she’s not in her best shape right now. But that’s my chance. And I took it and I’m so happy. I tried so many times and I finally beat her. It’s amazing.
“Two weeks ago I beat Ratchanok and now I beat Carolina. I know that I can beat the top players in the world and I will just try my best to work harder and to get even higher on the rankings. I’m also growing older, growing mentally, and I think that’s also why I’m standing in the quarterfinals.”
What explained her red-hot spell of form midway through the season?
“For a long period I’ve been working really hard. I just try to believe in myself every day. If you get one success and one win, it just gives more confidence. And I think the last four weeks for me here in Asia has been amazing. It’s my third tournament and third quarterfinal and that’s never happened before. I just feel confident and feeling in good shape and I think that’s why my form is good right now.”
Kjaersfeldt has rarely made heads turn at the major championships, but this time could be different.
“I know I can beat the top players and I know I can do this and now I will try to aim higher than the quarterfinals, to go further than this. Because I feel that I can do it. So I will aim for more.
“It’s a really tough women’s singles field. There are a lot of good players around, but I think I’ve shown now that I’m also here and I’m the one they have to watch out for.”
She takes on Kim Ga Eun in her opening round match, with a possible clash against top seed Akane Yamaguchi in the third round.