short play help needed

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I need some help with short play. Most of the time after my short service my opponents receive it rather long with a backspin, then I have opportunity to attack. But high level players catch me with short receive, especially to my FH side. For instance after my serve they just lift the ball and the ball goes very close to the net and the edge of the table in my FH. Since I am serving from my BH side I have long way to go to receive 3rd ball. Then because I am late ball is already dropping down and I cannot flick it, so I have to push it. Then the ball is long or medium long which is very easy to attack and because I am very close to the table it is all over.
Of course you can tell that I should predict what he is going to do, but I found that when I try to go very quick to my FH side, then he pushes long to my BH with a backspin, and of course I am not there to attack the ball.
 
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Hey Sali,

The drill I do with my students is to first practice getting the ball off the bounce.
So if you can say A is the off the bounce, B is higest point, C is coming back down, you need to get your bat to brush the underside of the ball at A (B is to flick)

You can get people to feed/drop the ball onto the wide forehand side of your table and you can practice coming in (assuming you are right handed), get your right feet as close to the ball, and stretch your upper body to reach the ball.
Then make sure you recover by using your body wieght and swing back to your left feet (which may be in the air due to your stretching reach on your right feet).
Make sure you try and recover to the backhand corner, so you are doing a BH to FH reach

This is to practice the contact + reach + timing (on the bounce)

Next is to practice the exact action - Serve, servce receive drop short and you drop it back short - focus on target placement - ie short again on opponent backhand side (closer towards you) or push long.

Another part you raise is not understanding your opponent's spin, that is a bit more difficult for now, as that has to do with what type of spin you serve and how he contacts the ball, so I hope you can train the above to "practice" more of the "set piece" you are having trouble with.

I feel by getting the footwork and contact, that should cover 80% of the solution to your problem
Now do 10000 of them and let me know your feedback :)
 
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Thanks for advice.
Since I am not young anymore and do not practice much I am looking for some advice which will not take 10000 times practice ;)
But even without opponent it is a good idea to stand in the bh marking serve and try to reach very fast short FH ball and going back to position. I will try it.

The Mahomedy idea I do a lot, but when I serve from the middle usually clever opponents send me long backspin to my body and of course I am not ready to play topspin.
I always had a problem to recover fast after my service when I stand sideways. When I stand facing the table it is much better, because I already have good position, but then I cannot make many variation serves.
 
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A more skilled receiver can also drop the ball short to the wide FH from middle of the table, in fact, they can also do it from the FH side of the table
+1 agree
Can even change ball rotation & direction and simply drop the ball close to the net to the other side away from the opponent. Specially players with hard rubbers on fh side they just simply scratch the side of the ball very thinly.

Solution: before you throw a serve think of all possible ways it can be returned to you and options you have to counter such attacks.. plan your play and make those legs work insane like speedy gonzales

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk
 
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says 2023 Certified Organ Donor
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Tony gave you a good drill. Thing is, he is assuming you already got effective stance right after the serve.

This is the part many players mess up - getting on balance low & ready right after the serve. One way many top players do is to either stomp with left foot or at least contact the ground with the left foot at impact (assuming RH player). The key is right after impact, you have to push off with left foot to hop swing into position. Usually, when a RH pplayer does pendulum serve, there stance is extreme open, sometimes even horizontal with table facing the rear! There must be a pivot/push foot to get player into slightly open crouch position right after serve. A few players have figured out how to do that with their RIGHT foot.

Whatever you do (I think left foot is easier) it is REAL important to push off with your foot to move you into a crouched ready position. Without that, you are usually too upright and too close to the table. That makes you vulnerable to a quick deep push at your body and makes it real difficult to move to the ball without falling over yourself. A wise player will see if an opponent is standing at near position of attention after the serve and drop it short (even if it is high) to the FH sideline right by the net. A player not in a crouch ready position will miss 8 out of 10 attempts to finish the point on that ball. Wise opponent know this and will use that over and over until you are blue in the face.

Once you are in a low crouch on balance right after the serve, you are ready (if you are flexing your knees right as opponent impacts ball) to pounce to wherever you gotta go and will be there on time to inflict damage and destroy your opponent's ball (if that is what shot you selected). You will also see the ball better this way. If opponent tries the fast push it right at you, you are already low and a 1/2 step off table and still have time to step around (if you were flexing kness at opponet's impact) or quick side shuffle and use your BH opening topspin loop. If opponent tries to drop the ball short next to the net near FH sideline, then you still only need one explosive step (under the table with your RIGHT leg) to get as far under table as you can, look over the ball, wait for it to come into your zone regardless of height of ball, then make your attacking shot. Better to hit in zone than to try to reach off balance and hit it off balance and miss.
 
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U R Welcome, practice first getting into a low crouch after serve. You will be suprised if you see yourself in a vid not being ready low after serve, many players who are not top players still do this, even if they know they should be down.

Once you got the habit of being in a good position crouched and ready right after serve, Tony showed you a drill to do that is tried and true. It is good for moving to the ball and touching it back low and short, and it is also good for practicing the flip. Just be sure to impact the ball inside your hitting zone, so if you are gunna bump it off the bonce, the positioning MUST be right there, for a flip, you might get away with a small error in position if you wait long enough for the ball to come into zone, even if it is below net you can make a strong shot, believe in your shot, just hit it inside your hitting zone.

Even if you are 60 yrs old, if you are crouched low ready right after serve, you can still get to that ball short by net near FH line with ONE step in time to do what you WANT to do in plenty of time. We all lose time because we are not in a position to move efficiently. I have seen O60 players move like cats mush more effecient and quicker toan some 20 yr old, because they were in a good crouch ready and knew what to do. That counts for a lot. Besides, you see the ball better from a crouch.
 
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have you considered serving from the middle of the table?it might be a good option.

This goes only so far. it is good for variation if you think opponent is pinning your middle, but good opponents can still find and exploit your middle.

Sometimes, it is a good variation to serve BH Tomahawk from BH corner to make ball curve barely off opponent's BH sideline very short, then right after serve, take a crab step to center of table to use more of it for BH. You will likely get a chance to use a BH opening heavy topspin, maybe you get lucky and get a high ball to BH hit for a winner.

Mostly defenders serve from middle of table, so they can make more use of their defensive BH shots.

I do not like the tactic of regularly serving from center of table as a means to get opponent to return it to your BH zone...(EDIT: for the purpose of setting up an offensive BH or avoiding getting pinned down) I think that tactic is only good as something else to show opponent.
 
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says 2023 Certified Organ Donor
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Another thing you can do to NOT get caught short on a short receive to your wide FH side near net is to serve LONG and SUDDEN right at a player's body... hopefully you add a lot of sidespin starting right at his crossover or a little on BH side, then ball breaks and as player set his position, he is now out of position to do teh shot he intended and you will likely get back an error in attack or a weak ball to turn the tables and attack.

Just having the threat of such an effective sudden serve will make that player LESS likely to anticipate and successfully drop a ball short on you in the almost casual manner you describe. That will open up many possibilities for other ways for you to apply pressure on your opponent in a match.

Maybe thee opponents see you do the same kind of serve and are too ready too early. Why not develop those fast deep sudden serves that break in on them to handcup them and watch an opponent freek out for once?
 
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My long serve is quite good I use it a lot to distruct my opponent, but I cannot use it all the time. I use two kinds of log serves one is going to middle of table and turning to his BH, so if he want to play with his Fh surely he will be too late, another serve is fast backspin into the body if he is able to attack it is quite weak and possible to react with power.
Anyway you made me think about recovering after serve and I intend to start practise it little bit. We will See if it helps.
 
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Thanks for advice.
Since I am not young anymore and do not practice much I am looking for some advice which will not take 10000 times practice ;)
But even without opponent it is a good idea to stand in the bh marking serve and try to reach very fast short FH ball and going back to position. I will try it.

The Mahomedy idea I do a lot, but when I serve from the middle usually clever opponents send me long backspin to my body and of course I am not ready to play topspin.
I always had a problem to recover fast after my service when I stand sideways. When I stand facing the table it is much better, because I already have good position, but then I cannot make many variation serves.

Then what I normally do is to recommend that the server not to stand on the far BH side (like pros).
Stand a bit closer towards the middle of the BH side of the table, or even serve near the middle line.
Or simply just don't serve balls that will come back short against stronger opponents.
The theory is simple - if you can't train or move like a pro, then the strategies can not be the same as pros. You need to design your own style to suit your physical and technical abilities.

Even though my 10000 is just a random number, but table tennis does require hours of training to get it to become perfect, in fact 10000 is far too little to be honest.
 
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