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Matt Hetherington made a post on FB about the modern trend towards the conformity of styles in table tennis and Richard McAfee chimed in with some interesting thoughts on the matter:
"Now that we have better television cameras and balls made of plastic, it would be interesting to experiment with playing with 38mm plastic balls. This would produce a better balance between spin and speed and allow some styles (especially away from the table) to make a comeback."
"The switch from the 38mm to the 40mm ball was done to improve visibility on TV and to slow down the game. However the biggest impact was on spin production with a decease measured at around 18% . The manufactures quickly made up for the speed decrease but physics would not allow them to make up for the loss spin. Again when we moved to the plastic ball is also was a small increase in ball size and another negative reduction of spin. When I was a player, someone with good spin production could control play. A heavy chop or slow heavy topspin was a real weapon. In the 1980s-90s, there were at least 8 styles of play at high level. With the ball changes that has been reduced to just 3. I think that a 38mm plastic ball would be somewhat slower and less spinney than the old 38mm but it would still be a better balance between spin and speed and allow for a wider variety of styles and more interesting play."
What do you guys think?
As a spin addict myself, I would love to see a change like that...
But perhaps there would be some unintended, knock-on consequences as well?
"Now that we have better television cameras and balls made of plastic, it would be interesting to experiment with playing with 38mm plastic balls. This would produce a better balance between spin and speed and allow some styles (especially away from the table) to make a comeback."
"The switch from the 38mm to the 40mm ball was done to improve visibility on TV and to slow down the game. However the biggest impact was on spin production with a decease measured at around 18% . The manufactures quickly made up for the speed decrease but physics would not allow them to make up for the loss spin. Again when we moved to the plastic ball is also was a small increase in ball size and another negative reduction of spin. When I was a player, someone with good spin production could control play. A heavy chop or slow heavy topspin was a real weapon. In the 1980s-90s, there were at least 8 styles of play at high level. With the ball changes that has been reduced to just 3. I think that a 38mm plastic ball would be somewhat slower and less spinney than the old 38mm but it would still be a better balance between spin and speed and allow for a wider variety of styles and more interesting play."
What do you guys think?
As a spin addict myself, I would love to see a change like that...
But perhaps there would be some unintended, knock-on consequences as well?