Young Link vs. Falcon? Not THAT bad IMO

[Avro-Arrow]

Alright so you may call me crazy, but in my humble opinion, Young Link can beat Captain Falcon. I feel like many of Falcon's approaches can be stuffed by boomerang and bomb, and YL's movement is good enough that he can get himself out of sticky situations. Angling the boomerang upwards or tossing a bomb at him stops him from approaching or can be used to ward off his approach (and he will have to respect it until the hitbox is gone). Oftentimes, this means that we can get a follow up with a nair. Nairs and dsmashes can lead to edgeguards. At this point, run-off nairs usually seal the deal. Retreating fairs can zone him out as well. And shield dropping an uair when YL is caught on a platform is extremely useful. Seriously, the move is active in 5 frames and pops him up for a combo. It flips the table by putting Falcon above YL for a juggle or a simple nair into edgeguard.

All this being said, I don't think this matchup favours YL. However, I do think it is workable, especially if the opponent has little or no matchup experience. I want you guys to share your opinions and experiences. Discuss.

 

[Phez_]

yeah imo you just have to be really fast, have really good projectile placement and punish him super hard. (eg. Stringing aerials together)
It's very difficult but I agree, it's possible

Last time I played this mu i got heaps of mileage out of baiting aerials and punishing with Bombs. If your shield drop game is good you don't have to be *that* worried about being above him on a platform. Shield Drop Uair
and I'm pretty sure YL's Uair > his Dair or any other option of getting back to the ground

 

[EddyBearr]

40:60 matchup at best. It's definitely one of Young Link's easier top tier matchups (easiest non-floaty), but it's still pretty bad. somewhere between 40:60 and 45:55 is Luigi-Falcon, which is nowhere as difficult as Young Link-Falcon.

Up-air and u-tilt strings are nice until the Falcon DI's, and stuffing aproaches are good until the Falcon dash dance camps and grabs.

 

[Avro-Arrow]

In this MU, I actually prefer taking him to larger stages so I don't have to run into dash dance camps at mid range and grabs. It means I have way more space to run around, and more space means my boomerangs and bomb pulls are less punishable. Plus, YL lives longer from the knee, and our kills will mostly only come from edgeguards anyways, so the blastzone sizes don't really matter too much. Anyone want to share their thoughts on stage selection?

 

[Phez_]

My thoughts :

FoD is good becaus he sucks on that stage
DL64 is probably alright because you have good survivability and room to move, but then again you rely entirely on edge guards for kills
PS might be good because Dair could kill at 150ish and you have horizontal space
I think Yoshis would be bad because a knee could kill at 50-100 and you have no room

 

[Snowbird]

with good DI the only way to kill falcon is edge gaurds.

 

[PlatPlat]

Battlefield>Get them out on the ledge>Stand near edge and D-Tilt when they try to grab>???>Profit.

 

[Mr. S]

It kind of goes without saying that the matchup is winnable; really, very few matchups (e.g. Sheik v. Bowser, Fox v. Kirby) can really be considered unwinnable. This is a really, really hard matchup for Young LInk because, like the rest of Young Link's top tier matchups, you have to rely a lot on clever mixups and hard reads. If you're playing against a competent opponent, you aren't going to be able to stuff his approaches with bombs and up-angled boomerangs forever.

The way to beat Falcon, just like the rest of Young LInk's high-tier match ups, is to get insane punishes and edge guard him whenever you can. Thankfully, Young Link's kit is very effective at edge guarding, and Captain Falcon's terrible recovery couples very well with that. Unfortunately, starting to get the punish on Falcon is really hard if they are any good at adapting. Falcons have no issue maneuvering around your camping and waiting for an opportunity; in a lot of matchups, Falcon has to play with that kind of patience. And with good DI, Falcon can simply avoid being punished too hard.

Young Link does not quite have the same advantage. Falcon's moves all have incredible reach and comparatively little recovery time. On top of that, Young Link's weight and gravity make him very easy to combo and kill at an early percent. In this matchup, you will die if you cannot keep Falcon out, and keeping Falcon out isn't easy. Though Young Link has a very good kit for camping, an exceptional projectile game alone can't really beat out Falcon's ridiculous movement options.

This is a hard matchup for Young Link, but it's definitely winnable.

 

[Hanbit]

I would think that, for falcons that prioritize the knee(and don't really know the matchup) is to interrupt with a ready bomb or a surprise boomerang whenever you see a jump of any sort.

this could cover the majority of their approaches, as falcon has no projectile to get in.

other than that, falcon is at a comfortable combo weight, and hitstun from getting boomeranged at mid percents is...

beautiful.

 

[SlimStealthy]

ive been playing this mu a ton lately, and the more i play it the worse it seems for yl. His nair and knee eats the boomerang, with good DI he will almost never die to the side, hes the hardest to kill off the top with dair, and he combos us to hell and back. One thing i always have trouble with is combo enders. After an up air chain or usmash, dair wont kill him usually, and nair/fair/bair send him nowhere so he can almost always just DJ back to ledge without having to use his **** up b. when he has to up b is of course when you kill him free, but honestly with good DI its hard to get him low enough to use it. and fishing for a dsmash leads to you getting kneed OOS. Just my 2 cents

 

[Chaos0205]

This matchup will never be in ylinks favor, but it is definitely winnable. Ylink definitely needs the bigger stages like PS and Dreamland. He can get quite a bit of mileage out of his projectiles, and once you get falcon offstage it should be easy enough to secure the ko. Definitely ban yoshis story. Its unbearable for ylink.

 

[ihasabuket]

Well you can downthrow techchase falcon because his techroll is awful and youre pretty fast. Upthrow has follow ups at around 45% (not sure about the exact number could be 50). Just dont get grabbed and stuff his approaches with fair, upair, uptilt, yknow, swordmoves. Only shield if you see an aerial approach and remember if youre in shield and he comes running to grab you can spotdodge or grab him. Try not to use projectiles unless hes really far or you hit him too far with an attack. Edgeguarding should be free, dont waste your time throwing projectiles if hes recovering from below theyl only pop him up so just focus on hitting him or grabbing ledge. If hes recovering high just throw projectiles to rack up damage and maybe get an aerial followup. As for stages what you really need is horizontal space, battlefield, dreamland and pokemon stadium.