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How to improve your movement to get counter drops back

I always found that having a tall and rather large build meant that I was vulnerable to counter drop or short shots; short shots which my opponent plays in response to my short shot. This was most apparent when I played a short shot from the front of the court and so was required to move into the front corner twice in quick succession; once to play my shot and then again to cover their counter.

How can you improve your movement to deal with counter short shots? 

Weight transfer is the most important thing when you are moving out of the front corner, as if you keep your centre of gravity in the right place you can leave yourself the option to move into the front again. 

The first part of the weight transfer is the lunge, squat or planting of your legs when you go to strike the ball. If you are lunging to an extent – whether it is as full stretch or a fairly shallow lunge – try to make sure you are using your back leg and non-racket arm to help you move out of your shot. This is done by allowing your back leg to drive through towards the ball as you follow through and keeping your non-racket arm back and out to the side. The momentum of the back leg driving through and the non-racket arm’s balance can then be used to help you move out of a shot and back towards the T-Position. 

Now comes the part where you need to really watch your weight transfer. Like a sprinter moving out of the starting blocks, it is really important that you stay low as you move backwards to the T-Position. It is very easy to spring out of a lunge and end up standing completely upright, but by doing this you will shift the majority of your weight backwards towards the T-Position, thereby throwing all of your eggs in one basket and making it very difficult to go forwards again. If you ‘unfold’ yourself gradually and stand upright again only as you get back to the T-Position, you will find it easier to shift your weight and move back towards the front corner again if necessary.

Whilst you are staying low and unfolding, you need to make sure you are taking small steps back towards the T-Position. The lunge might be a big step (of course assisted by the back leg and non-racket arm), but after that, you need to make sure that your steps are small and skimming the floor. Small, low steps also help to keep your weight in a more neutral position, as when you take big steps in any direction, you are committing your weight and therefore yourself to that direction and making it very difficult to change. That won’t help at all here given you need to go back in the opposite direction to which you were previously moving. 

Moving with shorter, lower steps is comparatively easy to practice compared with the lower centre of gravity, which can take a bit more practice and awareness. Ghosting and practicing the movement pattern is a very good way to start so that you can really feel the size and height of your steps, and also where your weight is as you move. You can then build that up by having someone feed you shots to the front corner, then the front corner and the back corner in a fixed order and lastly the front and back corner at random. You can then swap sides and add in more shots to make it more match-like.

One final thing; it can also help to change your grip as you move towards the ball. As you are taking your first step towards the front corner again, shift your hand down your grip to the very bottom of the handle in order to give yourself a touch more reach. You can read more about that on our post here.

Best of luck in maintaining a low centre of gravity and covering the front corners repeatedly! 

Swinging towards the front corner

A small change to your swing to boost your accuracy

It’s just a short post today to discuss a small tip that can help you to get the ball a bit tighter to the side wall from both the front and the back of the court. Sometimes it can be hard in a match to keep straight shots tight to the side wall, especially if the tempo is high. We’ve talked before about following through with your racket beyond the point of contact, but it’s also important to note that when you play a straight shot you should try to swing outwards and away from your body slightly. Doing this, you will be swinging towards the front corner of the court on the side which you’re playing the straight shot. This causes your shot to get that little bit tighter towards the side wall, and is particularly necessary if the ball is in the middle of the court.

What is an outward swing?

The outward swing should be led by your lower arm as you follow through a shot, and should end with your racket almost pointing towards the front corner of the court at the end of the follow through. Just as you are striking the ball, control your forearm so that your hand points towards the corner as you finish striking the ball and following through your shot.



The swing’s outward direction is usually quite subtle, as if you overdo it the ball can end up hitting the side wall too early, or even hit the side wall first. Although, it might need to be less subtle if you are in a central area of the court because your opponent has played a loose shot.

It can take a little bit of practice to judge how much you need to swing your racket towards the corner. Fortunately, given the amount of straight shots we play, it’s very easy to practice swinging outwardly towards the front corner during the warm-up or knock-up, most training exercises and matches. So, make sure you have a go and see if you can use an outward follow-through to make your straight shots tighter to the side wall.



Extending your racket in the front corner 

Sometimes when someone plays a really good drop shot, you need every bit of help you can get to return it with interest or even return it at all. Any little extra thing that can help is worth knowing and today we’ll be discussing how you can go full stretch with your racket by changing your grip as you move into the shot, which is an incredibly important skill to practice.



Holding the very base of the racket 

The end goal is to hold your racket at the very base of the grip to the extent that there is only a small amount of the grip between your thumb and fingers. You will of course be surrendering a lot of control over the ball by doing this but when you are at full stretch, keeping the ball in has to be the main aim.

As you move into the front corner, and do try to move very directly straight towards the ball, shift your hand to the base of the grip and the absolute lowest point you can keep hold of the grip without losing control or dropping your racket. You are aiming to essentially bounce the ball off the very top of the strings and into the front corner. It certainly won’t have a lot of pace on it but with a bit of practice and the right body angle – having the body facing towards the front corner – you can keep the ball fairly tight to the side wall.

If you are able to, also try to make sure you are also able to stretch back out towards the T-Position too in order to cover a long shot.

For more information about how to hold the racket, check out our page on the grip. 



Swapping the frying pan swat for a high to low chop

A small tip for improving your forehand volley

When hitting a forehand volley above the head, it is a very common but lazy technique for players to ‘swat’ at the ball with a frying pan style. By this, I mean starting with the racket face and inside of your wrist and palm directly facing the front wall and swinging downwards by bringing your hand straight towards the floor, not unlike a tennis smash. This style can be effective from time to time in hitting the ball hard and bringing it low but it can also result in errors and is rarely as accurate or consistent as an overhead volley hit with proper technique.

Opening the racket face and chopping

The way to achieve greater accuracy with overhead forehand volleys is to really open the racket face. For these forehand volleys, you can open your racket face by rotating the forearm clockwise (right handed players) or anti-clockwise (left handed players) so that the edge of your racket goes towards the ball first. If you can hit the ball with an open racket face, even when the ball is up high you will have much greater control over the shot. To bring the ball low, you will need to swing the racket from high to low, almost in a chopping motion. This ‘chopping’ motion as part of a high to low swing with an open racket face gives you far greater fine control over the ball than using a flat, frying pan swat swing.



This chopping motion can be particularly useful when dealing with a high serve or when you are presented with an opportunity to attack a ball in the middle of the court, so have a go and see if you can improve the quality and consistency of your overhead volleys.

Following through on backhand serve

As we’ve previously discussed on this blog, the backhand serve has so many advantages over a forehand serve when the server is serving from their forehand side of the court. It allows the server to move straight towards the T-Position as they hit the ball, to watch their opponent and it also creates an angle that keeps the ball closer to the side wall after it hits it. This last point means that returns of serve are often significantly weaker, which is perfect for you as it might give you an easy opportunity to attack or win the rally immediately, leaving your opponent struggling to get into the game.



The common mistake

Almost everyone serves using their forehand on both sides of the court when they start playing, which can make the backhand serve seem unnatural. This often leads to people having a go at it but giving up on it when it feels awkward or gangly. The easiest thing to do is to treat the backhand serve as a backhand volley, which is exactly what it is. By imagining that you are hitting a backhand volley, a player can shred some of the awkwardness that often causes backhand serves to be short or go out of play. Players with perfectly good backhand volleys will often go to play a backhand serve with a really strange and awkward looking technique and movement.

Throwing the ball 

As well as the awkward swing, the other thing that often hampers players playing the backhand serve is throwing the ball too close to their bodies as they go to serve. This adds to the awkwardness of the swing as the server then has little space in which to swing. When you throw the ball up for a backhand serve, make sure that it goes away from your body and gives you space enough to step towards the ball and swing with plenty of space. You might need to try a this a few times to get a feel for how much space you need to provide yourself with when you throw the ball. You can also check out our posts on using different throws when you serve and how to use the throw to make your lob serve even deadlier.

If you are struggling with the backhand serve, persevere. The dividends in the long run will be incredible. Experiment with the throw a little bit to ensure you have enough space and make sure your swing is fluid and resembles the swing you would use when hitting a backhand volley. It won’t be long before you get the hang of it and it will start to become a staple of your game.

For more tips on how to play the backhand serve, check out our page dedicated to it here.