Why so few twiddlers?

I think it's because the speed of TT. The moments you lost in twiddle would be crucial to get a right position to execute the stroke or not.

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yuri.saldon said:

I think it's because the speed of TT. The moments you lost in twiddle would be crucial to get a right position to execute the stroke or not.

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This

You shouldn't have enough time to do that but on smashes.

StuartMarquis said:

Clearly having two different types of rubbers on your blade and being able to twiddle increases the range of shots that a player can make...

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It also increases the number of shots you need to practice and training time to do that. The time needed to hone just one stroke to a reasonable level in table tennis is quite long. And you already have way more than one stroke regardless of your style of play, and then you double that number by twiddling... Well, good luck with that.

You do get twiddlers - professionals one/trained
But simply they do not get good enough to make it to the top.

And the analogy with golf is way off. its like saying, have a bat to serve, a bat to 3rd ball, have another bat to block and have another bat to attack? I guess you just don't have enough time to walk around and think of which bat to use

At the end it is all about first to 11 points, and first to 4 games (out of 7)
Twiddlers concept can work in the lower leagues. For the higher level players, this is more a weakness than strength - even look at your modern defenders (transitioned from classic defenders), they aren't coping..... - especially with reduce in spin nowadays.

There is some twiddlers in Chinese leagues, entertaining to watch, but definitely not on the team management brains trust of any future. Mind you, some of them are utilized as training partner

StuartMarquis said:

Thanks for all the responses. In recent years there seems to be a trend towards slowing the game down (speed glue ban, larger ball, and potentially raising the height of the net) so perhaps there will be a return towards twiddling and more defensive play at some point in the future?

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based on the changes during the past decade, I would say it did more harm to defensive play than good.
I doubt any further changes by reducing speed, spin or arc of the ball will do defensive play any good at all.
I reckon net height will pretty much destroy modern defenders, basically the 40+ is already a deep stab wound.

Also, penhold is also dying. Reason being - it is too difficult to master.
Same with "weird" styles and defensive styles

Tony's Table Tennis said:

based on the changes during the past decade, I would say it did more harm to defensive play than good.
I doubt any further changes by reducing speed, spin or arc of the ball will do defensive play any good at all.
I reckon net height will pretty much destroy modern defenders, basically the 40+ is already a deep stab wound.

Also, penhold is also dying. Reason being - it is too difficult to master.
Same with "weird" styles and defensive styles

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Most modern defensive players twiddle a bit – especially to push with their inverted rubber when the opponent has pushed a chop to their backhand. A few modern defenders (see Ruwen Filus – German national team, Ma Te – China’s national team chopper) even twiddle occasionally to play inverted powerloops with their backhand. So, I wouldn’t say that twiddling doesn’t exist at all at the top. In terms of a player who twiddles a lot, I can only think of Fabian Akerstrom – he won the Swedish nationals a few years back.
Twiddling works a lot at lower levels when people can’t read the spin from long pimples – but, true, as you go up levels it becomes less effective. I’m a bit of a twiddler myself, and I know when and when not to use it. As someone mentioned – if you do twiddle – you shouldn’t do so to play too many shots. Most top modern defenders just push or backhand powerloop when they twiddle. You won’t see any top players twiddling to play long pimples with their forehand.
For me, I find that if you play diagonally, twiddling can be effective. Then, you can cut off the sharp angles and give yourself a better chance of receiving with the side you want. It’s a tactic that can work at lower levels at least.

I addition to everything Tonys said (including the net height stuff), I would like to add another way to look at the "half of the clubs" analogy with golf. If, like nearly all good defenders, you use a markedly different rubber on one side -- typically long pips on the backhand -- you have effectively given up 99% of offensive capability on that entire side of your body. In effect THAT is giving up half of your clubs.

For the last 50 years or more, defenders have always been in the minority among top players. In fact, from a game-theory perspective, a lot of the success a few of those players do have DEPENDS on their being a minority strategy. There has not been even a single defender who has won a grand slam tournament in the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, or current decade. In fact, only one has even reached a final. The number of defenders in the world top 50 has stayed constant throughout this entire period. A handful can be effective because most players don't get a chance to play them very often and so don't know how to play them correctly. From this, at the top levels, one can clearly say that playing defense is over-rated. And in table tennis we don't have the equivalent of a Roland Garros Stadium with a super slow surface where a defensive style can be optimal. They are always fun to watch, though.

Golf if always a very bad analogy for the vast majority of what happens in table tennis.

If you're close to the table, also, you just don't have time to twiddle much. Actually, the best twiddlers I have seen outside Akerstrom and Filius are a handful of LP penholders playing in women's game.

Baal said:

... in table tennis we don't have the equivalent of a Roland Garros Stadium with a super slow surface where a defensive style can be optimal. They are always fun to watch, though.

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I just find it funny when a defensive player like Joo Se Hyuk is crushed by offensive oriented players like Xu Xin or Ryu Seung Min

Luis Nasche said:

I just find it funny when a defensive player like Joo Se Hyuk is crushed by offensive oriented players like Xu Xin or Ryu Seung Min

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Maybe now that is the case, JSH is not young anymore (36) and has also been battling some severe health problems that reemerge periodically.

XX never made it to the singles final of a grand slam event, and JSH did (beating Ma Lin, Kreanga, and Chuang Chih-Yuan). He had a win over Wang Liqin when that meant something. No accounting for tastes, but most people find JSH's matches make for great viewing. He made it at least as high as 6 in the world. When he finally retires, the sport will be a little more boring in my opinion.

Baal said:

Maybe now that is the case, JSH is not young anymore (36) and has also been battling some severe health problems that reemerge periodically.

XX never made it to the singles final of a grand slam event, and JSH did (beating Ma Lin, Kreanga, and Chuang Chih-Yuan). He had a win over Wang Liqin when that meant something. No accounting for tastes, but most people find JSH's matches make for great viewing. He made it at least as high as 6 in the world. When he finally retires, the sport will be a little more boring in my opinion.

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Sure, that is why I brought his name, he was the most successful defensive player from last decade. Ryu Seung Min was one of the few players from his time to beat him without a lot of trouble. When someone like Sansonov had to play him you could see his frustration after a couple of sets.

Tony's Table Tennis said:

Also, penhold is also dying. Reason being - it is too difficult to master.
Same with "weird" styles and defensive styles

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I recently asked my coach, who is a penholder at her prime, why she recommends students start as shakehander's if they're brand new when she herself played penhold professionally. She says because it's more difficult to learn the back side of the of the paddle and with how the game is now you need to have the backside." She believes penholders are at a disadvantage these days not because of the polyball or rule changes, but just because of how the game has evolved. Not sure if she feels the same about men penholders but that's her take on teaching children who are girls.

In the last decade or more with the efforts to slow the game, BH side became a lot more important. If the game is slow killing fh is less effective, because you don't have the necessary speed to win the point, if you pivot and your opponent block in the "open side" you lose the point. With poly ball game being even more slow that's why bh is so important.

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Shuki said:

I recently asked my coach, who is a penholder at her prime, why she recommends students start as shakehander's if they're brand new when she herself played penhold professionally. She says because it's more difficult to learn the back side of the of the paddle and with how the game is now you need to have the backside." She believes penholders are at a disadvantage these days not because of the polyball or rule changes, but just because of how the game has evolved. Not sure if she feels the same about men penholders but that's her take on teaching children who are girls.

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I would agree and disagree
I would say that speed glue, hidden serve, ball change (twice 38mm and 40mm) has all destroyed penhold.
it is not just Reverse side.
Penhold style from 20 years ago to 10 years ago to today is all different
Reverse side is what is keeping it alive
The requirement of fast footwork and good service/short game/3rd game is the difficult part for most to master - so much easier with shakehand

D_Nizzle said:

Most modern defensive players twiddle a bit – especially to push with their inverted rubber when the opponent has pushed a chop to their backhand. A few modern defenders (see Ruwen Filus – German national team, Ma Te – China’s national team chopper) even twiddle occasionally to play inverted powerloops with their backhand. So, I wouldn’t say that twiddling doesn’t exist at all at the top. In terms of a player who twiddles a lot, I can only think of Fabian Akerstrom – he won the Swedish nationals a few years back.
Twiddling works a lot at lower levels when people can’t read the spin from long pimples – but, true, as you go up levels it becomes less effective. I’m a bit of a twiddler myself, and I know when and when not to use it. As someone mentioned – if you do twiddle – you shouldn’t do so to play too many shots. Most top modern defenders just push or backhand powerloop when they twiddle. You won’t see any top players twiddling to play long pimples with their forehand.
For me, I find that if you play diagonally, twiddling can be effective. Then, you can cut off the sharp angles and give yourself a better chance of receiving with the side you want. It’s a tactic that can work at lower levels at least.

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I would say in Asia, Twiddle is maybe same as Penholds - it is a very small percentage
And the ones that rely on Twiddle is even lesser in percentage.

So twiddling "master" is a really small percentage in the top ranking

And in terms of world ranking - we all know the ranking is not correct.
How many WR20s and 30s will be pushed out to 50+ if China enters the 2nd string A team players?
Most of them are still ranked in WR20 but hardly play in the world (no chance to accumulate ranking points)
Thus my conclusions is, top players does not equal world ranking.
Its like say, Japan has the future as all the U15 players are from Japan (not a single Chinese in the top 50), we all know this is not true