Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

JeffM · Jul 25, 2016

ttmonster said:
Most people play 60% to 70% of the level they can show in practice. see if David can give you some feedback if he is around , he is a penhold guy and has
much more insight into all things penhold than us ....

See if this helps :

1. I think you are gripping your paddle too hard, so check on that .

2. Practice a lot of serves at home when you have time, not new serves or spinnier serves, just your regular serves. And I would say create a routine where you take 2-3 deep breaths before serving or receiving, don't worry if the opponent is waiting , you are supposed to play at the pace that is optimal for you and there is no rudeness in that.

3. Don't let your opponent dictate the pace of play. Take your time before you serve, think about what you are going to serve and why and what you are going to do next ...

4. When receiving serves, especially against somebody who serves illegal serves of the kind we are seeing here, I would have my left hand permanently raised, so that I get into ready position comfortably before he lets his cannon lose.

5. The above two has nothing to do with technique , so you should be able to incorporate in your game play if you stick it into your mind . The next ones are about technique so you can ignore them and not read them since you are going to your tournament , mainly, don't "ball watch" after you hit your first loop, get back to ready position , thats the reason you lost some of the points even though you initiated attack.

6. This one is to ponder over later , don't worry about this right now because it my interpretation of why you are making mistakes in your loop and you should really work on that with somebody in real life. I think on the loops you are missing ( not on all of them ) , you are going too much "up" with your arm , with a slightly late timing on the ball, with not enough forward motion, not enough brush contact and not enough waist rotation timed with the arm. To fix the timing you can ask somebody to block down the line while you loop slowly , same on the backhand side. I suspect because of the robot you use to train your strokes feeds the ball is a little higher than usual its giving you too much time to prepare your loop compared to actually real life balls. Again, I am not a coach but this is what I perceive, if you have a coach get it vetted from him after showing him the game play video. But I would not bother about that now , and just focus on holding the paddle not too tightly .

Hey Monster, thanks for the advice! I think I agree with all of them. I practiced serving today as well as usual forehands and backhands at home. And when I did the serving, I started to have a pre-serve routine. I can't comment on how well it is working for me yet as I have not tried it against opponents continuously.
But I totally agree with the holding the bat too tightly, I did not even think of that when playing. And the timing of the loop being off, I will practice that with a real person tomorrow at training.
I think my forehand loop feeling came back to me tonight when I played at home, I am uploading the video as I type this, and will edit my post with the video when it is finished

Does holding my left hand up signify I am not ready so if the opponent serves, they have to re-serve? I don't see this happen much at all at my club, so I just wonder how well it will work. I see it happen in professionals, especially with Lee SangSu in his doubles, but just wondering at amateur level, whether people still respect that or not.

ttmonster · Jul 25, 2016

You have to find out a way to stop them from serving till you are really ready to receive serve. This is a very common strategy to rush opponents. What I have found is that our level, its especially a disadvantage against people who don't properly toss the ball .
In actual tournament play, if somebody serves like the way your opponent is serving I will ask for an umpire without getting mad

. But otherwise I have decided not to make a fuss about it even i I lose because it just challanges my service return skills ....

For your forehand loop with your partner , have him block off the bounce and slowly increase the speed of the blocks , try looping down the line on either side after you have warmed up cross court.

I saw your robot video and see the balls you are getting are slow and there is an interval before the next ball , this is fine to practice correct form but I don't think it would help you fix your current problem , unless somebody here can tell you a different drill with the robot. I don't play against robots so I don't have much idea on how you can use it to fix your issue...

JeffM said:
Hey Monster, thanks for the advice! I think I agree with all of them. I practiced serving today as well as usual forehands and backhands at home. And when I did the serving, I started to have a pre-serve routine. I can't comment on how well it is working for me yet as I have not tried it against opponents continuously.
But I totally agree with the holding the bat too tightly, I did not even think of that when playing. And the timing of the loop being off, I will practice that with a real person tomorrow at training.
I think my forehand loop feeling came back to me tonight when I played at home, I am uploading the video as I type this, and will edit my post with the video when it is finished

Does holding my left hand up signify I am not ready so if the opponent serves, they have to re-serve? I don't see this happen much at all at my club, so I just wonder how well it will work. I see it happen in professionals, especially with Lee SangSu in his doubles, but just wondering at amateur level, whether people still respect that or not.

NextLevel · Jul 25, 2016

JeffM said:
Just in comparison to practice. In the match, I didn't loop balls over with my backhand much, keep missing the high balls, and bad positioning. I just didn't feel like Im playing like myself. But with the posts above, I know it is something that I will just have to work on, especially with the relax mentality, to play as if playing in practice.

You aren't supposed to loop high balls with your backhand. In fact, the backhand should play a very limited role in the success of a serious player unless the player is significantly backhand oriented, in which case it can do a little more but with a note of its limitations.

In general, the big problem with the backhand is that it doesn't have a large range of flexibility. You can't adjust to balls with tricky heights and trajectories easily. Trust me, if I had my way, I would never pivot. But if the ball is tricky and my opponent cannot block my forehand, why should I use my backhand? I only use my backhand on weak balls if I can predict the ball or if my opponent to can block my first loop in a way that gives me problems. In fact, very often, if I play third ball against someone, once I know the ball is coming long, unless they are higher than my level, I will pivot.

In general, unless you feel that you are better than your opponent, I am not sure what you are complaining about. You missed a few lobs, but that is natural if you don't practice against lobs. You used your backhand against balls that I would have used my forehand on. I usually use my backhand when I serve short and get a predictable push. If I serve long, I almost always intend to use my forehand unless I served long into the backhand fast and intend to power loop or punch the ball hard with my backhand.

Your opponent played fast and sometimes you kept your cool, sometimes you rushed along with him. He seems to be a topspin hitter/puncher. When you notice things like that, you have to figure out what you do that takes those things away while giving you the things you want. As you get better you will also learn that smashing to someone who is playing games off the table is not wise but you also have to practice from back there a little to understand how that person is looking at you. Close to the table, hitting the ball hard wins the point more easily, but once the person backs up, you need to use some placement and guile as well as variation of power.

But in any case, unless you feel you were a better player, which I didn't see, I don't get the frustration. Just remember that the easiest way to lose confidence in your backhand is to use it on weak semi high balls when you should be using your forehand.

I will watch more and reply later today.

JeffM · Jul 26, 2016

Thanks Monster, I'll try the left hand up strategy. I was using the robot to not lose the touch of TT, not really to fix any problems immediately. And since the last time I was having trouble finding the touch of forehand loop with the short balls from the robot, I found more confidence in it now.

Hey NL, I don't have frustration now anymore as I don't like to hold unpleasant feelings over prolonged periods. I guess my initial frustration was due to the fact that I could not replicate something in a match that I just did in training, but that has been explained by many others including you in previous posts. One thing I might have misled you in the post above was when I say I miss the high balls, I meant I did that with my forehand. The opponent explained it to me that I was rushing into it, so in practice, I would be waiting a little more to see if the ball would bounce sideways due to any sidespin, but in a match, since I was more anxious / wanting to win, I rush into it without tracking the ball properly for any side way movements, hence leading to missing the ball completely. This adds to the initial frustration as missing a high ball to me is a self error, but I am cool with it now that I can see where I can change to avoid that happening.

NextLevel · Jul 26, 2016

If missing the high balls is an error, why can Mizutani best almost everyone in the world lobbing except the top 5 players in the world?

ttmonster · Jul 26, 2016

Some of the issues can be solved if you can relax when you play matches. Remember what Der_Echte said , try to psyche yourself in a way such that you go into your trials with no expectation, don't go into it trying to prove somebody wrong or show how much you have improved while no one was watching , just go there to have fun ...

Just remember that table tennis is a complex sport and improving takes a lot of time and focused thinking and training. Its very easy to say "ma falesho kadachano" ... sanskrit for "don't worry about consequences just focus on actions" but may be easier to just tell yourself to have fun. Think that others have time for training and you train with a robot , you are just going there to have fun , win or lose . You have done the best preparation possible and whatever happens happens. Don't beat yourself up during the game , just try to focus on small things and try to play each point to the best of your capabilities with a relax upper body and make sure you don't drop your paddle below the table , don't expect any shot would a winner , expect it will come back and just have fun rallying ... and remember to breathe , thats it ....

This is what I would tell myself if I was in your position and making the mistakes you are making right now ... hope it helps ..

JeffM said:
Thanks Monster, I'll try the left hand up strategy. I was using the robot to not lose the touch of TT, not really to fix any problems immediately. And since the last time I was having trouble finding the touch of forehand loop with the short balls from the robot, I found more confidence in it now.

Hey NL, I don't have frustration now anymore as I don't like to hold unpleasant feelings over prolonged periods. I guess my initial frustration was due to the fact that I could not replicate something in a match that I just did in training, but that has been explained by many others including you in previous posts. One thing I might have misled you in the post above was when I say I miss the high balls, I meant I did that with my forehand. The opponent explained it to me that I was rushing into it, so in practice, I would be waiting a little more to see if the ball would bounce sideways due to any sidespin, but in a match, since I was more anxious / wanting to win, I rush into it without tracking the ball properly for any side way movements, hence leading to missing the ball completely. This adds to the initial frustration as missing a high ball to me is a self error, but I am cool with it now that I can see where I can change to avoid that happening.

JeffM · Jul 26, 2016

That helps Monster

I'll try to get into the play for fun attitude.

NL, this is an interesting topic

Usually I don't like to bring in the top of the world players because their levels are so high that it doesn't make too much sense to compare, but, from my view, Mizutani does not beat almost everyone in the world by 'lobbing'. When I watch him play, my understanding is, yes he is a good lobber, but he does not go into lobbing actively to win it, but more of a strategy when he is put out of position. If he likes to go lobbing every point, you will see him lobbing in every point from 2nd or 3rd ball.
I can see the point you are trying to make, that hitting a high ball is not easy. I agree with you. But to say missing a high ball is not an error, that I disagree. Since we are talking about the top of the world professionals now, I rarely see them thinking to themselves, "yup, it is ok I missed that ball because it is high." Most, if not all, will show some kind of discontent when they miss it, almost like, I got him to lob already, the point should be mine (except when it clips the net or off the edge). Sometimes you can also see relief from the lobber as he delights to have the point.
There are of course exceptions to this, such as choppers, but that is irrelevant here as I am not a chopper and I am not playing a chopper.
Sorry, as English being my second language, I think when I say 'self error' in my last post, I was more referring to unforced error. Now I know that may open another can of worms, as one can say the opponent did 'force' me to hit a high ball. I will defend by saying, with high balls, I often miss because I rush it or I try to hit a one shot killer instead of setting the position up with several hits and then finishing it.

Archosaurus · Jul 26, 2016

High level pros have an astoundingly good attack. It's quite a rarity to beat them with lobbing, and they're more consistent than inconsistent in their smashes and loops against high balls.

Why would you sweat it if you miss a high ball, when even players of that caliber miss high balls?

Think of it relatively: If you're a bare beginner of a month or two and do 10 or 20 consecutive quality forehand counterhits with your partner, that's a very good achievement. For high level players, that's nothing. They can do hundreds in their sleep and will get irritated if they can only do 10 or 20. Should the beginner?

ttmonster · Jul 26, 2016

@JeffM , I think what NL was trying to say was that it seems like unforced error but it is not ... hitting high balls is not always easy and there could be multiple reasons for that. I have seen a lot of players in the 1800-2000 range have this problem that goes unexploited. The reason I know this is because we have a very crafty older gentleman who regularly uses this kind of balls as part of his street smart strategy to defeat a lot of younger players even though he is considerably slower and barely ever loops on his forehand , all he uses are blocks . Not saying it works all the time , but it does . A good practice is not try to kill it , and rather be patient, alert on your feet and try good placement with 60-70% force to setup subsequently increasing stronger attacks ..

JeffM said:
That helps Monster I'll try to get into the play for fun attitude.

NL, this is an interesting topic Usually I don't like to bring in the top of the world players because their levels are so high that it doesn't make too much sense to compare, but, from my view, Mizutani does not beat almost everyone in the world by 'lobbing'. When I watch him play, my understanding is, yes he is a good lobber, but he does not go into lobbing actively to win it, but more of a strategy when he is put out of position. If he likes to go lobbing every point, you will see him lobbing in every point from 2nd or 3rd ball.
I can see the point you are trying to make, that hitting a high ball is not easy. I agree with you. But to say missing a high ball is not an error, that I disagree. Since we are talking about the top of the world professionals now, I rarely see them thinking to themselves, "yup, it is ok I missed that ball because it is high." Most, if not all, will show some kind of discontent when they miss it, almost like, I got him to lob already, the point should be mine (except when it clips the net or off the edge). Sometimes you can also see relief from the lobber as he delights to have the point.
There are of course exceptions to this, such as choppers, but that is irrelevant here as I am not a chopper and I am not playing a chopper.
Sorry, as English being my second language, I think when I say 'self error' in my last post, I was more referring to unforced error. Now I know that may open another can of worms, as one can say the opponent did 'force' me to hit a high ball. I will defend by saying, with high balls, I often miss because I rush it or I try to hit a one shot killer instead of setting the position up with several hits and then finishing it.

NextLevel · Jul 26, 2016

JeffM said:
That helps Monster I'll try to get into the play for fun attitude.

NL, this is an interesting topic Usually I don't like to bring in the top of the world players because their levels are so high that it doesn't make too much sense to compare, but, from my view, Mizutani does not beat almost everyone in the world by 'lobbing'. When I watch him play, my understanding is, yes he is a good lobber, but he does not go into lobbing actively to win it, but more of a strategy when he is put out of position. If he likes to go lobbing every point, you will see him lobbing in every point from 2nd or 3rd ball.
I can see the point you are trying to make, that hitting a high ball is not easy. I agree with you. But to say missing a high ball is not an error, that I disagree. Since we are talking about the top of the world professionals now, I rarely see them thinking to themselves, "yup, it is ok I missed that ball because it is high." Most, if not all, will show some kind of discontent when they miss it, almost like, I got him to lob already, the point should be mine (except when it clips the net or off the edge). Sometimes you can also see relief from the lobber as he delights to have the point.
There are of course exceptions to this, such as choppers, but that is irrelevant here as I am not a chopper and I am not playing a chopper.
Sorry, as English being my second language, I think when I say 'self error' in my last post, I was more referring to unforced error. Now I know that may open another can of worms, as one can say the opponent did 'force' me to hit a high ball. I will defend by saying, with high balls, I often miss because I rush it or I try to hit a one shot killer instead of setting the position up with several hits and then finishing it.

I never said he does, I said he can. You need to watch how those points play out to see that Mizutani has been coached to stop lobbing. And Mizutani is not relieved to win a lobbing point, he expects to win a lobbing point.

In any case, hitting a lob is not quite the same thing as hitting a high ball. Lobs also present very specific challenges because you have to track and adjust to the ball and its timing over a longer distance than most people are used to so it challenges footwork and ball tracking. Most people are not used to looping balls at the height of a lob ( I struggle with counterlooping high topspin balls even away from the table so I need to adjust my table distance). If you don't respect the challenges of hitting a lob, you will struggle with them over time as you will get frustrated when you should sometimes understand what is happening so you can devise other weapons or understand what makes a lob a quality lob vs a weak lob (distance from the net and spin is a huge thing). Also, you will feel as if the lob is an opportunity to end the point, when it is really just another rally stroke and you have to continue to play the point out.

Missing a lob is to me no different from missing a loop from my opponent. I just get ready for the next point. And the same way I try to avoid feeding my opponent's looping game if he loops better than me, I try to avoid feeding my opponent's lobbing game if he lobs too consistently for me to overpower him. I try to play the point sequence to avoid the lobbing rally. You have to make a realistic estimate of who is winning the points when a situation shows up or you will play into point losing situations thinking they are good for you. You may be right in some high level sense, but you have to deliver in those situations or find alternative strategies. Unless you are taking a long term view of the match.

There are USATT 2200 players in the US whose primary mode of play is the lob. So trust me, there are players who can beat you fairly easily just by lobbing to you unless you practice a lot against it. IF you are saying that you and your opponent are at the same level and that your smash should beat his lob, that is one thing. But if your opponent is a level above you and you haven't practiced against lobbing, you should be ready to lose more than your fair share of points in the lobbing rallies.

JeffM · Jul 26, 2016

I went to a different club today to practice. First lost to someone 3:1, but then beat the same person 3:1 in our second match. Then I went to train with my friend who is better than me. I practiced backhand looping backspin, 3rd ball attacks, and then just random serve and receive drills. At the end, for unknown reason, I cannot loop with forehand. Then I realise my H3 neo rubber just became slippery. (it was not wet with sweat, but the ball can slide on it as opposed to gripping). I don't know how to solve this problem at the time, so basically I cannot hit with forehand anymore. Then I went on to do some backhand topspin and finish off the training with blocking his loops.

Has anyone experienced that problem with the rubber becoming slippery but not from sweat? I tried wiping it off, but it doesn't work, it is still slippery, as if it is humid. But it did not even rain today, and my friend's rubber was fine, very grippy.

Archosaurus · Jul 26, 2016

JeffM said:
I went to a different club today to practice. First lost to someone 3:1, but then beat the same person 3:1 in our second match. Then I went to train with my friend who is better than me. I practiced backhand looping backspin, 3rd ball attacks, and then just random serve and receive drills. At the end, for unknown reason, I cannot loop with forehand. Then I realise my H3 neo rubber just became slippery. (it was not wet with sweat, but the ball can slide on it as opposed to gripping). I don't know how to solve this problem at the time, so basically I cannot hit with forehand anymore. Then I went on to do some backhand topspin and finish off the training with blocking his loops.

Has anyone experienced that problem with the rubber becoming slippery but not from sweat? I tried wiping it off, but it doesn't work, it is still slippery, as if it is humid. But it did not even rain today, and my friend's rubber was fine, very grippy.

I know it's a far stretch, absolutely unthinkable, but what if, your rubber is simply getting worn out?

Pricey 11 · Jul 26, 2016

Chinese rubbers are known to be affected by humid conditions when I used to use H3 on my forehand (I play penhold too btw [emoji2]) after a few hours the rubber became slippery simply due to the moisture in the air.
To be honest I never found a way around this problem and it was one of the reasons I switched to MXP

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

ttmonster · Jul 26, 2016

may be its worn out , may it was the humidity , may be it was you, its difficult to tell from out here. Give it shot again in the practice hall you are supposed to have the trial and if it still feels the same way then its worth thinking about changing the rubber ...

Pricey 11 · Jul 26, 2016

NL said:
If you like I can post some videos on Thursday evening as I have a league match and you can compare to me. I'm not sure what your level is but I play in 1st division and will be playing some top 150 England rated players so I might be able to help you with some strokes etc [emoji2]

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

JeffM · Jul 27, 2016

Pricey 11 said:
If you like I can post some videos on Thursday evening as I have a league match and you can compare to me. I'm not sure what your level is but I play in 1st division and will be playing some top 150 England rated players so I might be able to help you with some strokes etc [emoji2]

Given how close the trial is and I don't want to play more than usual, I will try again on Saturday and hold off the idea of switching rubber. I think Pricey's theory is probably the most likely, as the rubber did play fine for the majority of the session (2 hours), and then it became so slippery that my opponent have a look and finds it very odd.

It will be really appreciated if I can see some footage from you Pricey, as you are a penhold player and plays at such high level.

Boogar · Jul 27, 2016

Archosaurus said:
I know it's a far stretch, absolutely unthinkable, but what if, your rubber is simply getting worn out?

I don't think thats the case. I played with H3 for the my first year of tt and the damn thing can still lift up balls I even played outside with it. However it has enormous problems with humid rooms and sweat. So its probably that.

Ilia Minkin · Jul 27, 2016

Boogar said:
I don't think thats the case. I played with H3 for the my first year of tt and the damn thing can still lift up balls I even played outside with it. However it has enormous problems with humid rooms and sweat. So its probably that.

Ilia Minkin said:
Ok, here is my daily story.

Today I played a practice match. In the first two games I fooled around experimenting with different serves and receives and lost the games. Then I decided to play seriously and easily pulled out to 2-2. As it often happens in such matches, the fifth game went totally downhill. All my forehand openenings went into the net like rocks and soon I was down 6-10. Then I suddenly realized that there is a huge, massive blot of sweat on my FH rubber! After cleaning it I won the match, but it was so frustrating to miss that many shots because of it.

Interestingly I was playing with my spare racket that had H2 on forehand

Boogar · Jul 27, 2016

@NextLevel
@Upsidedowncarl

In the league videos you just posted NL, is that carl playing in the background?

NextLevel · Jul 27, 2016

Boogar, if Carl came to Princeton to play in the league, you would have heard about it.

Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Well-Known Member

Member

Well-Known Member

Member

Well-Known Member

Active Member

Well-Known Member

Active Member

Well-Known Member

Similar threads