English Dub Review: The Prince of Tennis II: U-17 World Cup “One’s Resolve… One’s Conditions”

Overview (Spoilers Below):
Having lost both doubles matches against Switzerland, Japan begins its decisive #3 singles between Akutsu and Switzerland’s Amadeus.

Our Take:
This series has continuously proven that reaching the top of the leaderboard is no easy task, especially when you’re a part of Team Japan. This episode is no different, as Japan faces another tough team from the U-17 World Cup Top Four: Switzerland. As seen in the previous episode, Team Japan has already lost both doubles matches against Switzerland, showing how skilled the opposing team’s players were. So it appears this match will make the previous games against Germany, Greece, and Australia look like child’s play.
This episode now brings us to the singles match between Japan and Switzerland, which would decide which team moves forward to the next round. Akutsu plays for Japan, while Amadeus plays for Switzerland. These two players have unique abilities that make the match enticing and surprisingly long. I mean, how does a single game last more than an hour because of that?
For starters, Akutsu has high energy and power, resulting in him having heightened senses and representing multiple possibilities at once to confuse his opponent. Unfortunately, it also resulted in his feet bleeding in his shoes because of the amount of power he uses. Then we have Amadeus, who has a “Dark Side” shot that makes his ball into a shadow. He once used it to knock out Akutsu, but later on, it was blocked by Akutsu’s speed representing ten patterns at once. However, despite Akutsu’s efforts, he fainted during the match, resulting in the coach sending him back to Japan.
The episode offers another engaging round with tiny bits of a character’s background, mainly Amadeus. During the match, Amadeus reminisces about growing up in a war zone, with tennis being the only thing keeping him going. More importantly, it features a brief tease of Ryoma facing his greatest challenge outside the tournament: finding his true path. Seeing that he’s been sitting on the sidelines, this would hopefully give the main character a chance to shine on and off the court.