Ryu vs El Fuerte

El Fuerte

Matchup:

In my opinion, when Ryu's fireball is useless, that matchup is never in Ryu's flavour. Therefore when it comes to Ryu vs Fuerte i would say 4:6 and when it comes to TKD's fuerte...2:8. ( I am not the only player in Japan who rated this matchup when it comes to TKD's by the way.) However, since i played TKD countless times i do have alot of experiences against Fuerte and handling against certain situations. So here it goes..

Anti Air:

All the attacks that Fuerte can land on you is mainly off the ground so with good AA would allow you to shut down all his attacks. In this matchup, jab srk (even if you miss your jab srk, Fuerte does not have enough time or enough range to land the *Loop), and *instant* jump strong would be the best tools to use to stop his moves and off the wall jump in attacks.

Ground Game:

Far Range: This is actually the only time you can throw safe fireballs and there's not much u can do in this range. Therefore it is a good chance  to build meters with jab SRK.

Mid Range: Use low strong instead of low forward (because low forward has a longer recovery time) and don't throw any fireballs as long as he's runnning. Any of his moves off running ( except slide kick ) shuts down fireball. On top of that, this is Fuerte's best range, so be patience and wait for him to make his moves.

Close Range: When it comes to close range, Fuerte doesn't have much to hit you with and this is the best chance ( like Dhalsim, you have to get close inorder to win) for you to beat him. Once you get close, try to land untechable wakeups moves such as throw or combo into a sweep. Don't fear to use more low jab to lock him on the ground and hit him out of the air if he tries to backdash and jump back.

Mind games and Option Selects:

Since Fuerte has few good escape moves on wake up such as Ex run back, the Guacamole Leg Throw and he has a pretty good backdash. So how to deal with each of his escapes?

Ex run: A(n) *ex* tatsu works perfectly since Fuerte's Ex run has 2 armor hits, therefore *ex*tatsu would break his guard before he can run back. Another option is throw.

Guacamole Leg Throw: Against this move, a jump in OPTION SELECT jab srk would work perfectly. Timing is a bit strict but with practice it will auto correct wherever he flies.

Splash Throw: You can evade this move by crouching and AA by a jab srk

Backdash: Jump in OPTION SELECT jab srk, tatsu, sweep. On ground you can guess and use tatsu or be safe and use OPTION SELECT sweep.

On my wakeup:

Though El Fuerte has a lot of scary mind games he can do on your wakeup, mashing on backdash is the best escape for Ryu. Ryu is able to backdash out of most of his running moves except the slide and sometimes the splash ( sometimes i get hit, i don't know why )

Against Ultra 1:

Strong El Fuerte's with perfect timed Ultra 1 can be deadly. They would try to bait you with a jump to land the ultra. In this case, Ryu should always have one gauge so that you can empty jump without being scared of Fuerte's Ultra. As long as it's an emtpy jump, if Fuerte's releases his ultra, you can escape with Ex tatsu. Also, throwing fireballs when Fuerte has ultra meter is totally not recommended.

Against Ultra 2:

Basically the same one you fight against Ultra 1, in my opinion i think this ultra is not as scary because you can throw fireballs against this ultra. Ex tatsu works well against ultra 2 since the ultra would whiff and Ryu would have enough time to punish with a big combo.

Things to be aware of:

El Fuerte can never land big damage except the loop. Fuerte can only land this loop on Ryu unless Ryu whiffs a move with long recovery (eg. Fierce SRK) or gets crumpled by a Saving level 2/3 attack.

El Fuerte can do a safe jump on Ryu *ONLY* if you get hit by the running tornado grab. So beware, if you happen to get grabbed by that move, the next timed jump in is a safe jump. In other words, you would not want to do anything since it will whiff or gets beaten, so blocking or saving dash out of the attack would be your best and only choices.