capcom always make a matchup impossible for hawk in the games that he participate, they must hate he lol
honda on sf2 days, now blanka, whos next? the blanka matchup in super turbo isnt that bad, you can mixup when you et a knockdown, now hes wake up options are too good
Sagat, chun and rose aren’t much better than blanka imo.
As a Blanka main that is learning to play T.Hawk… here’s some tips (before AE 2012…then the match up is gonna be even more ridiculous… sorry guys… but Blanka do need some loving as well)
Most of the advice given are decent already… however your goal against Blanka is… to get him in to the corner… you can do this by just playing ultra patient… by simply walking forward a bit… .block… walk forward a bit… poke to interrupt (not spam)… you shouldn’t be bothered with the chip damage … you should think of it as your extra health is enough life to make up for the difference for a few chip damage…
a cornered blanka is pretty much a dead blanka… becuase if you manage to corner him you should be able to punish him back even if he hits you with up ball or horizontal ball… and if you manage to knock him down… you should be aware of ex meters… on wakeup blanka mainly got two main options… 1) ex rainbow out… 2) ex upball… however if you time your attack (lets say s.MP for now) to beat out ex rainbow and just get hit by ex upball… you can punish blanka’s ex upball afterwards…
you shouldn’t bother using spire or dives unless you are sure he can’t punish you… and you want to push him or close the distance to the corner.
hops in general loses to spamming c.LP… even if it’s cancelled off from moves… even if your reaction isn’t that fast you should at least make an attempt… because the recovery from hop is quite terrible…
as for how to deal with his other pokes… FA in general if he’s starting to use more normals to push you back instead of balling you and you block and you move forward and pressuring him… all his good long ranged normals outside of pokes can’t be cancelled into specials and they are all one hit with long recovery… that is very weak against FA… although T.Hawk’s FA isn’t really that good in general… you kinda need it against blanka who plays footsie with his normals a lot…
Anyways… hope these tips will help you guys a bit… I still haven’t played T.Hawk enough to have faced a decent Blanka yet… but… I figured as a Blanka main, some insights on Blanka’s weakness might help now… especially if nothing changes for 2012… Blanka is gonna get one of the biggest buffs (knockdown ex upball) and the Blanka anti-wakeup strategy/OS doesn’t really apply anymore.
-LAU
Any blanka that hops you can be SPD’d, DP’d, Ultra’d or otherwise combo’d for free. In all circumstances. This includes if blanka hits you with a cr.mk and cancels into hop. He’s at something like -6 (and this is the best version of hop).
Also blanka can use MP ball, it’s equally as safe on T-hawk and is usually what I combo into. But i rarely do any combos on T-hawk. I rarely do anything on T-hawk other than let his own buttons get himself killed.
Some notes on these things:
Rainbow rolls are often (almost exclusively) used as a wakeup reversal.This means they will break armour. But the blanka should use the meter on an up ball instead unless he’s escaping the corner.
If you block a slide at anything less than max range, free spd.
try and create situations where an up ball on wake up will whiff. This is your only chance for a punish outside of the corner. Also if you don’t have an u2 OS for up ball, get one. As once you have the meter, and blanka has any ex at all, this should be done on every. single. knockdown.
Jabbing balls is a start, but you really need to DP every single one of them. It’s hard yeah, but that’s just the way it is. You can’t really afford a non-optimal punish.
Once Blanka has meter you have no way in whatsoever, so you need a lifelead before this point in the first round. At that point if you fail to deal with any single one of Blanka’s offensive options and lose the lifelead, you’ve already lost the game. In the second round if blanka has meter he has to screw up or your lose the game. So really try and get him to burn it if you can. Bait up balls, use that tank health.
In my opinion, a blanka that knows this match up and plays correctly cannot lose. At legitimately high level I feel the only reason this match-up is not 10-0 is human error. So your only chance to win it is with a completely optimum response to every mistake blanka makes, then pray he makes enough to lose all of his life.
That’s really all you’ve got at the moment.
I don’t even like fighting T-hawk, it’s the stupidest match up in the game.
Updated change list- Blanka get 5 more recovery frames on EX upball
awww… i was hoping the distance would change… I’d rather get a close strong combo rather than a dash up SPD…
No you wouldn’t.
The whole change surrounding ex up ball is* fantastic* for T-hawk. I guarantee you.
Lol, nitpicking over what punish you would rather have on block instead of just accepting that you get a punish? >___>
Just sit with db, spam lps and punish what you can punish. Slides are a free SPD, balls from far away with a little prediction are always caught clean by spire and once you are sitting on U2 the match gets a lot easier, since any ball at that time is a free U2. If you can get a BNB off, you might be lucky to dizzy him early enough.
This matchup really isn’t fun. It’s a lot of hard work and often enough Hawk still loses. It can be very frustrating.
The problem is the hard work is pretty much in vain as all of the tips given in this thread, and all tips really giveable are only useful when the blanka is doing something stupid haha.
Blanka needs up ball, hori ball, dashes and downback to make this 10-0. The only time there is even a contest is when blanka somehow gets hit first and doesn’t have a life lead.
Once blanka knows the match up it’s completely over. If he doesn’t know the match up then it’s 7-3.
would gladly money match the best hawk players in the world.
Dunno about 2012 though. Maybe it’ll just be 7-3 or something by then haha.
Decent Blankas aren’t gonna do unsafe slides. Good luck using spires to stuff balls, that’ll never work in the long run and it’s more like guessing cause of spires slow startup. Getting a dizzy? Lol, how do you dizzy a character that you can’t even get near?
Everyone makes mistakes.
It works even if you trade with it.
You sure your stick is plugged in correctly?
I know the matchup is braindead from Blanka POV, but it’s still not impossible.
Like I said in another post, you gotta play retarded. Forget everything you know about SF and just do random crap until you get a health lead lol. That’s the only way I ever beat a Blanka, and that’s rare. Sitting there patiently doesn’t do anything, you’re just stuck in a burning building basically. The waiting game only works with shotos and Guile IMO.
I’ve just come to accept that it’s a horrid match up that’s going to stay horrid in '12, so I just accept I’m going to lose the match as soon as I see that green turd. The only things I try to gather from that match up are tools to take with me to the next one.
Yep, just like that. Throw out something unexpected and get close, once Blanka is under pressure and Hawk is on a lifelead those green fuckers are going to make mistakes.
Chazz is getting raging.
just rage out your ultra’s.
it is what hawk is about.
maybe you get lucky and grab him with it.
against blanka is like 9-1 or 10-0.
against sim is already 9-1 or 8-2.
guile and deejay is a good 8-2.
hawk is mission impossible.
do you hear that beat?
a new movie is coming.
at least in mission impossible it is possible to do the mission.
if his name was ethan hawk then maybe we can get the job done.
The random tactic worked for me at the arcade yesterday. Tried to be orthodox against this blanka and lost badly in the first game. Tried to “KOG” him by being a bit more random. The tactic worked and I managed to win the 2nd game hehe
I’ll start to participate in local tournaments here in Germany soon. I think I will refuse to shake hands with Blanka players, especially if they win by counterpick. What do you think? 
Personally, I don’t respect any counterpickers in general but I like your idea. If they pick Blanka then don’t shake their hand and if they pick alt 3 on top of that then I think that’s reason to punch them in the face, what do you think?
Just shake their hand. As much as we all hate the Blanka matchup, you have to show people that you are more mature then letting stuff like this get to your head and interfering with the enjoyment of others. Most people are just there to have a good time, so don’t provoke them because it doesn’t add to the fun.
Handshake with a hidden needle then.