Hun vil ikke tabe til sin gamle modstander igen.

Because in Danish, ikke usually comes after the finite verb in a main clause.

Here, the finite verb is vil, so the normal order is:

Hun + vil + ikke + tabe ...

A rough pattern is:

subject + finite verb + sentence adverb + infinitive/rest

So:

• Hun vil ikke tabe = She will not lose / She does not want to lose

This is different from English, where not is usually tied more directly to the auxiliary.

Vil can express several related ideas:

• future: will
• intention / willingness: wants to / intends to
• sometimes refusal in other contexts

In this sentence, Hun vil ikke tabe ... igen can naturally suggest:

• She does not want to lose ... again
• She will not lose ... again

The exact nuance depends on context. In everyday Danish, vil often carries a sense of intention or willingness, not just neutral future.

In Danish, if you say you lose to someone, you normally use:

tabe til nogen

So:

• tabe = to lose
• tabe til sin modstander = to lose to her opponent

This is just the standard Danish construction. English uses lose to, and Danish does too.

Compare:

• Hun tabte kampen. = She lost the match.
• Hun tabte til sin modstander. = She lost to her opponent.

Because sin is the reflexive possessive. It refers back to the subject of the clause.

In this sentence, the subject is Hun, so:

• sin gamle modstander = her own old opponent

If you used hendes instead, it would normally mean someone else’s opponent, not the subject’s own.

So the contrast is:

• Hun vil ikke tabe til sin gamle modstander igen.
  = She does not want to lose to her own old opponent again.

• Hun vil ikke tabe til hendes gamle modstander igen.
  = She does not want to lose to another woman’s old opponent again.

This is a very important Danish distinction.

Because adjectives usually take the -e form when they come after a possessive such as sin, min, hans, etc.

So:

• en gammel modstander = an old opponent
• sin gamle modstander = her old opponent

This is called the weak adjective form.

A useful rule: after words like min, din, sin, vores, the adjective is usually in -e form.

It can mean either, depending on context.

gammel can mean:

• old in age
• former
• longstanding / familiar / old

So sin gamle modstander might mean:

• an opponent who is elderly
• an opponent she has faced before
• a longtime rival

In many real contexts, a learner should expect old opponent to mean something like former or longtime rather than literally elderly, unless the context clearly points to age.

Because the possessive already makes the noun phrase definite enough.

In English you say:

• her old opponent

not usually the her old opponent

Danish works similarly:

• sin gamle modstander

not sin den gamle modstander in normal usage

So the possessive sin replaces the need for an article.

After modal verbs like vil, Danish uses the bare infinitive, without at.

So:

• vil tabe
• kan tabe
• skal tabe
• må tabe

not:

• vil at tabe

This is similar to English:

• she will lose
• not she will to lose

So tabe is infinitive because it depends on the modal verb vil.

Igen means again.

It comes at the end here because that is a very natural position for it in Danish:

• Hun vil ikke tabe til sin gamle modstander igen.

This means she has lost to that opponent before, and she does not want that repeated.

You can sometimes move igen, but the end position is the most straightforward and natural here.

Yes. Danish often allows fronting for emphasis, but then the finite verb still stays in second position in a main clause.

For example:

• Igen vil hun ikke tabe til sin gamle modstander.
• Til sin gamle modstander vil hun ikke tabe igen.

These are more marked and less neutral than the original sentence.

The neutral version is:

• Hun vil ikke tabe til sin gamle modstander igen.

So the original is the best basic pattern to learn first.

Yes, modstander is a common word meaning opponent or adversary.

It is a common gender noun:

• en modstander
• modstanderen
• modstandere
• modstanderne

In the sentence, it appears in the singular after a possessive:

• sin gamle modstander

That simply means her old opponent.

In practice, vil ikke tabe is understood as does not want to lose / will not lose. The negation applies to the verbal idea as a whole.

So learners should read:

• Hun vil ikke tabe
  as
• She does not want to lose / She will not lose

rather than trying to split the meaning too mechanically word by word.

This is normal with modal verbs in Danish.