What kind of playstyle you are more/less effective to play against?

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Hi all!

I know that each player is unique, but generally you have a kind of player that you are most effective to play against and another kind of player that you struggle to play, so I thought it would be nice to build a thread that each one of us say's which kind of players we prefer and hate to play! So I'll start:

I'm most effective with:

- LP defenders : Really enjoy to play against this kind of players. I can make great rallies against them!
- JPen players: We only have one JPen in my area. I like to play against him as he does his "fake loop" with his 1-ply hinoki blade and we end up making good rallies as I can deal with spinny loops. Ofc he has his top gear and it's powerfull, but allways quite spinny, which makes easier to me for counterloop.
- FH-oriented shakehanders: I like to play against them because usually they spend their stamina moving around the table to prepare their FH loop.

I struggle more with:
- Lefthanders: It's really difficult to me, because playing against a lefthander forces me to use much more my BH than I normally use. Left handers gos easier to me with SP on Backhand.
- Pips-out hitters: I struggle to play against a good pips-out hitter. Because I play mostly with FH with a lots of spin and their flat hits makes more difficult to me create spin and then I go out of position.
- CPen players: We have 2 Cpens here. One has a "godmode" FH. Basically he loops and counterloops everything with his FH. But his loops are very spin heavy and much more powerfull than any shakehander that I've played. Plus I have to be much more carefull with short game because at the first ball he has a chance he can flick more easily than a shakehander. The other one hits more than loops, bue he can kill the spin so heasily with his flat hits and turns difficult to play against him closer to the table.
- Double winged loopers: As I'm too much FH oriented I struggle against a double winged looper as they can put pressure on me with their BH and FH, and I mainly can put with my FH(now that changed a bit with SP on my BH).
 
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Biggest Struggles Against:

- People with really good touch play who prevent me from looping. (I don't flick)

- Anyone with short pips. It messes up my timing. SP on backhand is tricky. Cpen with SP forehand is also pretty difficult. Sometimes I play against a Cpen guy with SP on forehand anf LP on backhand. It's awful.

- Little kids who scream after they win a point. (It's unsettling. LoL)


Good play against:

- Choppers and heavy pushers. I love looping back spin.

- Lobbers. Who doesn't love to slam continously? ( Unless they are putting weird sidespin on the ball. Then I wind up missing and looking like an idiot). (But I eventually adjust).

- Lately I've been improving a lot against blockers / counterhitters. I used to get beat a lot by experienced old guys who lack mobility. They would block all my loops or wait patiently for an easy ball to kill. I've gotten a lot better at 5th and 7th ball follow ups after looping.





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I struggle the most against lefties. It’s way harder than any other type style like SP, anti etc. reading the spin on their serves is my biggest issue.

Just one comment. LP players comes in three (or more) different styles. Choppers, push blockers and modern defenders. Playing against good push blockers can be a nightmare as you get very little time and the balls you get back can be horrible.
 
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Easier to play against players with bad serve and return game.

Pushblockers Do not suit me so good because i have short pimple on the forehand. Low backspin to the forehand is the worst ball for me. Can not Do so much there compare to inverted against backspin and short pimple against topspin. Can only lift the ball and it is very difficult to smash if they keep the ball low with backspin. But i have trained against these players so i can play them pretty good. I try to Do heavy backspin and then attack hard, smash against their Nospinball.
 

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First disclaimer, I’m a beginner so things are probably much different at my low level than for everyone else here.

But I like playing lefties, because my brother and practice partner is a lefty so I look like I’m better than my level against them.
I do poorly against strong servers and very fast players.
Im terrible against cpen players with a good third ball attack.
 
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I was built to play with heavy top-spin players. I can counter-loop until my legs fall off and have no problem moving to the ball.

I was NOT built to play with players who take all speed or spin out of the ball on each hit...so I'm forced to try and add power to a dead/slight-backspin ball that's in the middle of the table.
 
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generally speaking, i'm more effective against weaker players, and less effective against better players, whatever their style LOL

I feel I am rather good in rallies, and my weakness relative to my overall level is my own serve game, although i can of course be struggling on receives as well. If someone manages to receive aggressively my returns I will be in trouble. I am especially bad (like many) to receive the short FH area and that can be exploited again and again against me.

If I don't make too many direct receive mistakes and can take the initiative first most of the time, i will have a very good chance to win, and cause an upset. If the guy goes a bit far from the table its usually even better for me, although I've lost some matches being overconfident.

I don't like much playing SP hitters, LP blockers and penholders who are good with the traditional BH push.
 
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Penhold single-side short pips, I play good against:

Penholder attackers: I'm a penholder myself, so I guess its the understanding of a similar mindset. I especially like playing against very aggressive 3rd ball attackers who look for the first chance to step-around to their backhand side. The attack is usually strong, but predictable (80% of the time a long cross-court loop) which I love counter-smashing against. For the risky ones going for a step-around down the line, if I can survive it, even a mediocre block to their far forehand usually ends the point. Also, I guess I haven't reached a high enough level, but most RPB players actively look for the opportunity to use their "RPB", I'm a traditional penhold backhand and in most BH-BH rallies, I can win against RPB'ers on consistency and sudden change of directions.

"power loopers": Again, benefiting from the predictability. Also, "power loopers" usually go for hard, but safer placement shots (ie not very often going for short and extreme angles). Also, "power loops" usually bounce higher than spinny brush loops, so if I can get in position well enough, I can borrow a lot of energy for the counterattack.

I struggle against:

Allround players: especially the very smart ones relying on consistency, mixing spins and placement. These people play a fair amount of VERY spinny, low, and mid-short initiating loops which I find to be very hard to be active against. They quickly take the initiative and follow up with an arsenal of well-placed albeit not very fast shots. I can also be a little too aggressive at times and step out too wide, they beat me on consistency.

Choppers: a mixed bag. I'm good against lower-level choppers, press their backhand which they are more accustomed to chopping against loopers than a smasher. But more experienced and especially attacking choppers get the best of me from their mixed style. Also, there are no prominent choppers in my club, so I don't get enough practice.
 
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ok i had a tournament today, and i have to include a type of player

the short guy penholder playing with SP and serving long flat serves without throwing the ball... He aced me several times and surprised me with some special PH sidespin and placement. I even totally lost my nerves, and complained about his serves (during and) after the match, which may be the first time ever in more 30 years playing this game.

:-/
 
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ok i had a tournament today, and i have to include a type of player

the short guy penholder playing with SP and serving long flat serves without throwing the ball... He aced me several times and surprised me with some special PH sidespin and placement. I even totally lost my nerves, and complained about his serves (during and) after the match, which may be the first time ever in more 30 years playing this game.

:-/


Sorry for the delay of the answer. happened something similar to me too but the things gone wrong.

It's common around here players with "stupidly" illegal serves( I think no one throws the ball totally upwards, but as long as the ball is thrown with a 90% vertical motion and the ball isn't hidden, it's ok).

I've played against a man with an extremely awkward game. He seemed he used anti spin on both sides(I'll tell you in the end of the post what he uses) with a rubbers that were much larger that the blade's head size.

So we started to play, and he didn't threw the ball high enough. He basically had the ball near the blade and quickly throwed to his bat to serve, and that was almost impossible to receive, at least to receive and create him difficulty. So I said that to referee(was another player that was on our group phase) and he warned the other one. He didn't liked but he tried to throw the ball higher, but only next one or next two serves, then he ""forgot" and returned to almost don't throw the ball. With that I got tense, and I was leading the game 2-0. After I lost first set, I got more tense and warned him again and he got mad at me because he said he's service was totally legal and I got much more tense. The game turned 2-2 and I thought "It's useless to say something to him as he will get mad and I'll get more tense, so I'll cheat on my serves too". I got very tense and I did that, and tried to finish the ball on third ball. I've won to him 10-3 and I "chooed" every ball(not to him, that would be disrespectful, just to get the stress out of me) and he walked very nervous to me and he said that was against the rules, and my pratice partner said to him "So you're saying that he's getting out of the rules by "choing", but you are no the rules by having the rubbers 1 cm bigger size than your blade and serving without throwing the ball?" The things got tense here and the man started to be rude with us and he walked very nervous in our direction, meanwhile the referee tried to stoped him, after he started to yelling at us, trying to surpass the referee to hit us and I throwed my racket to the table and said to him "if you want to hit me go on, do it." and another player from another table jumped out of his table where he was playing and tried to attack me without knowing what's going on in our table... and then was such a confusion, every on around, trying to calm down everyone, that almost turned a battle between everyone. For luck people know me and know how I am so I got no problem, and also I sent a mail to Portugal Table Tennis Federation exposing that situation and no one cared, because the other player that tried to attack me is "protected", you understand right? It was like, if I was guilty I would be suspended, but because organization friends, nothing happened to them(the one I played and the one that jumped to my table to attack me)... Later a friend said me that he was a cheater and that he also uses hairspray on his rubbers to get totally no friction on his rubbers so I don't need to say nothing more... Because in that league I play, unfortunately there's no racket control....

So unfortunately, since that happened, when I caught a serve cheater I have to cheat too on my service, unless it's a match with official referees, they have "power" to say something. I play TT to have fun, not to have problems like that :p

Next time you caught someone like that Penholder, probably you should do the same if you are complaining and he doesn't care about that :/
 
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We have an old man (70+) in one of the training groups which also uses double sided anti. His serves are similar to what Eduardo described. The ball is kind of thrown against the racket and they're super fast. Last night I played some sets against him with OX LP on one side. I simply put the racket to the ball and let it float back in an extremely wobbly fashion. I usually win with 3-4 points but last night I won 11-1 11-2 11-1. Very entertaining.
 
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@eduardo

actually I filmed the match and his serves were legal even if they didn't look legal.
Basically I lost my nerves and that cost me the match. First time in more than 30y of TT I'm doing something so stupid...

Woow. But you realised that in the game or after watching the video?

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after watching the video

Don't worry, we have always a moment where we lost our nerves! We just have to try to improve from that moments! When I was a kid I was always losing my nerves(Michael Maze have some fault, I was watching to much him play in this time) if I wasn't playing like I wanted, and I've improved a lot and now I'm very calm and friendly while playing and I think it's much more positive this way ;)
 
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