Yes, I know: another serve rules rant...

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Hi everyone,

I'm watching the EOSQ tournament @ Guimaraes, Portugal, and then this happens:
Jian Nan YUAN vs Sabina MUSAJEVA, YUAN serves @ 4:50 mark and one of the referees does not even let the ball fall down after the toss leverage and calls for fouls with a penalty point against YUAN.

Ok, so YUAN is known for having a ridiculous high toss, but her serves are pretty straight: no hidding whatsoever, straight toss, not on the table but well behind the line. Her first serve is effective: you can see the ball really sinks down the topsheet and the side/backspin is insane for sure. This is to me how serving should be taught in TT schools/clubs.

So why a referee is calling for a foul @ 4:50 ? to me these crazy serve rules are bringing really terrible situations... I've watched this serve many times, I don't see anything wrong, it seems that maybe the referee didn't like the high toss because YUAN then started tossing way less high, but there's nothing in the rules telling you shall not toss at a specific height right ?

So what is the problem here ?

Why are obvious hidden serves not called, and why is this is one called ?

EDIT: I've listen to the referee's complain "imparting spin from/for the ball", so the referee thinks she's spinning the ball while tossing it ? come on...

https://www.ettu.tv/en-int/playerpage/548716
 
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The referee indicated that she spun the ball when she threw it up. This used to be a common trick for high toss servers, usually ones that played with pips. No idea if she actually did it on purpose. The difference is propelling the ball straight up from the palm (good) or having the ball roll down your hand and come off your fingers and imparting spin (bad).

 
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The referee indicated that she spun the ball when she threw it up. This used to be a common trick for high toss servers, usually ones that played with pips. No idea if she actually did it on purpose. The difference is propelling the ball straight up from the palm (good) or having the ball roll down your hand and come off your fingers and imparting spin (bad).

Really ? she shows the ball in the palm, hand well opened, no fingers can impart any spin whatsoever then, she makes sure to toss VERTICALLY, by 1st lowering the arm vertically too. It's impossible to impart spin that way, the only way is by rolling the ball with a slight horizontal motion (by pulling our arm to our body really quick, I know the spin cheat too since years), and she does not do any thing like that.

In today's stage 2, she played her regular high toss serve again, and no referee found anything wrong to call.

These stupid serve rules are causing too much misinterpretations, it's either no referee calls for obvious hidden serves, or they call for imaginary fouls. I've watched both Prithika Pavade and Jia Nan YUAN matches today in stage 2: Pavade's serves are really questionable, if anyone can see the ball's contact, then he's capable of X-Ray vision... and she's never called.
 
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Music&Ping;344132 said:
Hi everyone,I'm watching the EOSQ tournament @ Guimaraes, Portugal, and then this happens:Jian Nan YUAN vs Sabina MUSAJEVA, YUAN serves @ 4:50 mark and one of the referees does not even let the ball fall down after the toss leverage and calls for fouls with a penalty point against YUAN....https://www.ettu.tv/en-int/playerpage/548716

Hi M&P. I am also an umpire. I also confirm the sign the umpire gave was for imparting spin to the ball.How did he determine that? Well. guess you gotta ask that umpire. Unless there is an RPM detector, it is next to impossible to tell the amount of spin.

There is ZERO way to toss the ball and have zero spin, so it is all based upon the guidance (if any) given by the referree brief to umpires and the individual judgement of the umpire.Watching the vid, I have zero way to tell if there was enough spin on the ball for me to fault the server. One thin I see is she dips he hand with the ball below the endline a few cm sometimes - that is supposed to be a fault. So many pros do that, includiing Suh HyoWon and countless others, that it is rarely if never called.

YJN is making an attempt to mitigate that. You can see sometimes she lifts the hand with ball up a few cm before dipping the hand for the "Backswing" part of her toss.

If it is anything, Mike Meier, an International Umpire assisted the making of Korea, As One movie... and in one scene, even though at the time this was not a rule, he also portrayed an Umpire in that movie... at a real critical point at 9-9 in final set, he faulted the Korean team for a 4 meter high toss serve for having spin. The next serve, the Korean team tossed it high with next to zero spin, and the movie used some computer trickery to show the ball, a CHAMPION 40mm celluloid ball that may or may not have been produced at the time, doing a neet knuckle float all the way to top of really high serve and neeto trick impact by server... I think it was all an advertizement for a Korean company.
 
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Ahhhh, the serving rules again 😋

I still play in two clubs, having been thrown out of another after suggesting that anybody
who chooses to ignore the serving rules was trying to get an unfair advantage.
In the two remaining clubs everybody seems to be aware that the "ignoring " is happening and the consensus seems to be : this train has gone, good luck trying to stop it.

Personally I think it is a matter of character and personal pride.
I would feel very very proud to be able to say " I belong to a club where the serving rules are strictly observed."

Tennis , football and many other sports are using technology to mainly check line-faults etc.
last year in a big (?) china tournament they used the 17 Cameras and PCs , and many of the greats were "called" incl MaLong and Timo Boll.....................I had my hopes up then...........................now it is gone again 🤔
 
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Generally as allowed by rules, it is common courtesy that the umpire give a warning for a violation if the violation can be considered questionable. In this case it seemed to be, unless the umpire felt this was a blatant violation. If it was me I would ask for the referee.

If I had already lost the round robin & know I won't advance, then I would ask for referee and have a lengthy argument almost until I get an yellow card. Then I would continue to do the same faulted serve over & over again. Then towards the end of the match I would do a different borderline violation and if I am caught and faulted again, I would ask for a referee again. If yellow carded I would continue arguing till I am red carded. Then I would explain to the umpire why he was crazy.

This was a bad call because I do not think the ball rolled off the palm to the fingers for sure. Given that there is no limit to how high you can throw, i am not sure if the umpire can call it a fault for imparting spin, unless there is a clear directive in the super secret umpire's manual that players seem to have no access to.


 
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there are things that we do not see watching a video. This is a question of facts not a question of interpretation.

I am afraid you are very wrong. If you slow down the video, you will see that the ball clearly leaves from the palm and not fingers.
That said , you have not addressed the issue of what the umpire directives are regarding cases like this where the ball starts spinning but not due to anything the player did, unless there is a limit on the height of service toss (there isn't). You also did not answer why the umpire did not give a warning
I do understand & totally agree with you that videos can be very misleading sometimes, but sorry to sound harsh, but this is definitely a clear set of facts but you are of course welcome to interpret them to your own convenient set of falsehoods.

 
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there are things that we do not see watching a video. This is a question of facts not a question of interpretation.

I would like to suggest a very slight change in the wording :" IT SHOULD BE a question

of facts instead of interpretation.""


Of course as long as the referees ARE humans ,by the nature of the animal, ALL

decisions will be subjective.


I have after all seen situations where both refs put up their

hands..................................one favoring player A the other player B

 
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I am afraid you are very wrong. If you slow down the video, you will see that the ball clearly leaves from the palm and not fingers.
That said , you have not addressed the issue of what the umpire directives are regarding cases like this where the ball starts spinning but not due to anything the player did, unless there is a limit on the height of service toss (there isn't). You also did not answer why the umpire did not give a warning
I do understand & totally agree with you that videos can be very misleading sometimes, but sorry to sound harsh, but this is definitely a clear set of facts but you are of course welcome to interpret them to your own convenient set of falsehoods.

I did not state m stand but rather reserved my judgment. Even as a trained umpire, it is different from being there on the game itself.

 

I would like to suggest a very slight change in the wording :" IT SHOULD BE a question

of facts instead of interpretation.""


Of course as long as the referees ARE humans ,by the nature of the animal, ALL

decisions will be subjective.


I have after all seen situations where both refs put up their

hands..................................one favoring player A the other player B

If you have undergone umpire's training, there are only 2 things in approaching the situation - whether it is a question of facts or question of interpretation.
​​

 
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I did not state m stand but rather reserved my judgment. Even as a trained umpire, it is different from being there on the game itself.

I am going to support Yogi on this one.

Umpires must make the call right there live without looking at slo-mo vid. They must analyze and decide instantly with decisiveness and be very clear in articulating what the foul was about.

The laws of TT clearly state that if the umpire is not convinced that the serve is legal, then it is an illegal serve.

Anyone wanting to look at a clean serve can look at Vladi Samsonov. He tosses ball high and doesn't have this issue.

A larger issue at hand is NOT that umpires are untrained or do not know what to do... Umpires have much training and knowledge/experience on average.

There are a couple issues going on.

1 - Umpires are not paid professional money for a professional job. They are paid next to zero. A pro doing professional work for 5 days, which is a regular work week, gets $2,000 to $4,000 USD. International umpires get on average next to nothing after transportation and room/board. Even a buck private in the US Army gets paid more than an international umpire to get yelled at by drill sergeants and do push-ups all day and still gets free room and board. (and free uniforms and pro gear)

You should not expect professional work for pay that is hardly minimum wage.

2 - Umpires are not uniformly brave. There reasons for this. If umpires fault Ma Long for hiding serve with shoulder, then they will be treated by fans, TT media, and pro players/coaches like real terrible. This is a real pressure and umpires are not paid enough to stand up to that. They may also want to continue serving as an umpire (since they is no pay) and if they "rock the boat" whoever manages and selects umpires can ensure they are not umpiring matches anytime soon.
 
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This is NOT a question of the legality of the serve, her free arm should have been no where near the ball at the time it was struck let alone right in front of it when she made herself so much time.
This is a question of how he would tell it was spun.

Even if he called it for a wrong reason he still has a second option within the rules for the penalty. there is a minimum of one Violation here but if she spins it two.

As a no-professional untrained umpire I think very highly of my own opinion. I think from my sofa I can deduce the secret of the CNT if only i had some more cheetos
 
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I am going to support Yogi on this one.

Umpires must make the call right there live without looking at slo-mo vid. They must analyze and decide instantly with decisiveness and be very clear in articulating what the foul was about.

The laws of TT clearly state that if the umpire is not convinced that the serve is legal, then it is an illegal serve.

Anyone wanting to look at a clean serve can look at Vladi Samsonov. He tosses ball high and doesn't have this issue.

A larger issue at hand is NOT that umpires are untrained or do not know what to do... Umpires have much training and knowledge/experience on average.

There are a couple issues going on.

1 - Umpires are not paid professional money for a professional job. They are paid next to zero. A pro doing professional work for 5 days, which is a regular work week, gets $2,000 to $4,000 USD. International umpires get on average next to nothing after transportation and room/board. Even a buck private in the US Army gets paid more than an international umpire to get yelled at by drill sergeants and do push-ups all day and still gets free room and board. (and free uniforms and pro gear)

You should not expect professional work for pay that is hardly minimum wage.

2 - Umpires are not uniformly brave. There reasons for this. If umpires fault Ma Long for hiding serve with shoulder, then they will be treated by fans, TT media, and pro players/coaches like real terrible. This is a real pressure and umpires are not paid enough to stand up to that. They may also want to continue serving as an umpire (since they is no pay) and if they "rock the boat" whoever manages and selects umpires can ensure they are not umpiring matches anytime soon.

poor overworked and underpaid umpires should have their load lightened with that beautiful 17 camera / pc


software. Where did it go ?????



It was the software that told the umpires that there might have been a fault, then the

umpire called it.


tHE PLAYERS HAD THE RIGHT TO CHALLENGE IT.



Both Malong and Timo challenged.


Malong lost the challenge because the replay videos proved that he was hiding the ball


with his head


Timo won his challenge because the video showed his ball moved higher than the


minimum (16cm) by half a cm.



I love these accurate decisions , especially when I got $ 100 000 on the winner 😁

 
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I do not say the umpires do not do their job in violation of the ITTF Handbook. My exact point is: when rules are tailored so that too much space is left to a 75% interpretation VS 25% fact ratio, something's clearly wrong.

I know referees have to judge a situation, so yes indeed they have to INTERPRET a situation. And that's of course the same in any sport, whether he/she can be assisted by technology or whether /he/she cannot be.

Problem is: they have to interpret too much subtle parameters for human senses capabilities.

Old school rules had that "marging of error" included, because less parameters had to be judged by the umpires. Therefore less players and coaches were whinning or complaining, same camouflage/hidding rules for everyone. You had, as a receiver, to use MORE of your ears and eyes to see what was going on, nowadays we are just making receivers being blind and deaf.... and being worse of it all whiners !

Jia Nan YUAN isn't complaining here, she could have been though, first serve BAAAAM ! penalty point, that's rude for a so much subtle and thin spin parameter to be judged in my opnion. She's a real pro, she changes her way to serve, and she wins. That was the perfect answer to that pooor umpire.

The even better answer: the match after in stage 2 she wins coming back to her "normal" way of serving, and she wins, no opponent, no coach, no umpire having anything to say.

That's why I'm writing that rant, and that's why after having refereed so much matches in the 90's, I'll go back to that way of judging a serve: ball toss more than 16 cm height, and that's all. Unless technology helps me of course, and unless blatant violations like... free arm camouflage, but there I'll be clear and sincere: imaginary line at 45° drawn on the table from the end line, if the free arm isn't between that 45° to 90°/side line so angle at contact ball moment, then OK I'll throw a penalty. But as I'm not allowed to stand behind the receiver to see what's REALLY going on, I'll not do more than that. As no technology will help me see if any strong spin is imparted to the ball, I will not do more than that.

I'm not a 6 billion dollar man. And I'm not going to pretend being one.
 
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lodro, even after you said what you said, I umpire for free at every chance possible, maybe I am a poor professional umpire.

Maybe even worse, I coach players for free often, and often, I greatly upset the TT coaches who depend on that money.

I run blade challenges for custom blade makers, even though I am a brand distributor. Maybe I am a poor businessman or just not hold it so important.

Just some background info to make the totality of circumstances better understood.
 
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lodro, even after you said what you said, I umpire for free at every chance possible, maybe I am a poor professional umpire.

Maybe even worse, I coach players for free often, and often, I greatly upset the TT coaches who depend on that money.

I run blade challenges for custom blade makers, even though I am a brand distributor. Maybe I am a poor businessman or just not hold it so important.

Just some background info to make the totality of circumstances better understood.


Sometimes is it difficult to get ones feelings across, just using words.


I want to assure you that my words re poorly paid and overworked umpires was free of any cynicism.


I can see the high activity happening on theses big TT meetings and assume that after umpiring


matches the whole day one would be half dead.


But I also genuinely belief that any electronic/optic/software related assistance should be welcomed.


This takes nothing away from the umpires it simply gives them another tool to work with.



p.s please do not forget to eat a nice pickle with you quarte-pounder, ohh and some chips 😁

 
This is NOT a question of the legality of the serve, her free arm should have been no where near the ball at the time it was struck let alone right in front of it when she made herself so much time.
This is a question of how he would tell it was spun.

Even if he called it for a wrong reason he still has a second option within the rules for the penalty. there is a minimum of one Violation here but if she spins it two.

As a no-professional untrained umpire I think very highly of my own opinion. I think from my sofa I can deduce the secret of the CNT if only i had some more cheetos

The umpire is not obliged to give a warning for service violations but rather the umpire can directly fault the player. It is out of courtesy that umpires issue a warning but it does not mean they cannot fault a player immediately.

 

I am going to support Yogi on this one.

Umpires must make the call right there live without looking at slo-mo vid. They must analyze and decide instantly with decisiveness and be very clear in articulating what the foul was about.

The laws of TT clearly state that if the umpire is not convinced that the serve is legal, then it is an illegal serve.

Anyone wanting to look at a clean serve can look at Vladi Samsonov. He tosses ball high and doesn't have this issue.

A larger issue at hand is NOT that umpires are untrained or do not know what to do... Umpires have much training and knowledge/experience on average.

There are a couple issues going on.

1 - Umpires are not paid professional money for a professional job. They are paid next to zero. A pro doing professional work for 5 days, which is a regular work week, gets $2,000 to $4,000 USD. International umpires get on average next to nothing after transportation and room/board. Even a buck private in the US Army gets paid more than an international umpire to get yelled at by drill sergeants and do push-ups all day and still gets free room and board. (and free uniforms and pro gear)

You should not expect professional work for pay that is hardly minimum wage.

2 - Umpires are not uniformly brave. There reasons for this. If umpires fault Ma Long for hiding serve with shoulder, then they will be treated by fans, TT media, and pro players/coaches like real terrible. This is a real pressure and umpires are not paid enough to stand up to that. They may also want to continue serving as an umpire (since they is no pay) and if they "rock the boat" whoever manages and selects umpires can ensure they are not umpiring matches anytime soon.

ITTF Umpires are only paid 25USD per day :(

 
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