How to return a block from anti-spin rubber

[MasterMyself]

Hi guys,

This is my first post here, well my first post was related to buying a blade from this forum

Yesterday I was playing a friend who plays T05 on FH and anti-spin on BH, actually a semi-spin one that can generate a bit of spin if you put in the effort. So when I serve backspin, he blocked back so the ball came back with slightly topspin. The ball was low so I looped it straight across the table. But if I put power on it, the ball would go too long most of time. Over the course of the match, I slowly adjusted and looped it over with less power and spin but I felt I can do better than that and hit with a more offensive return. Any help would be appreciated.

I am using H8 non-boosted on my FH btw and have adopted the full arm stretch style to loop or smash. (learnt when I was a kid).

Thanks
Al

 

[vvk1]

Try adjusting your swing so the bat's face is less open and instead is almost parallel to the table. Swing faster, more forward than upwards and go for a thinner contact over the top of the ball. Finally, try to place the ball well, and only then worry about power.

 

[NextLevel]

One of the mistakes we make in TT is feeling well can do better without practice.

That said, if you close your paddle more, you are 99% likely to keep hitting the ball long as I suspect this is what you are already doing. What you need to do is a bit more technically complicated and requires you to time your wrist snap at the ball and make your topspin at a point on the ball at a point very close to contact, closer to the top because it is a deadbolt. In other words, loop the ball with the same wrist snap you might use for looping underspin but use that snap at a higher point on the ball. This will add the topspin requires for the ball to dip. You need to add topspin to the ball and not just swing hard into it.

If nothing I wrote makes sense, then just do what vvk1 said. Good luck.

 

[MasterMyself]

thanks.

Agree NL. So now I know what to practice. Basically brush the top of ball with a lot of wrist power but less direct impact to generate high spin that cause the ball to dip rather than going long. I assume I have to execute this at the top of the bounce?

I will post a video later when I can.

 

[NextLevel]

thanks.

Agree NL. So now I know what to practice. Basically brush the top of ball with a lot of wrist power but less direct impact to generate high spin that cause the ball to dip rather than going long. I assume I have to execute this at the top of the bounce?

I will post a video later when I can.

The general idea is important - the rest is practice. I've always shaken my head when people say things like top of the bounce etc. You just practice the different timings and see what works and let the brain adjust. But if you want to get into that, if you relaxed and took the ball later, you were probably doing something like this on the back of the ball. What causes the issues is that people when they swing hard over the ball, they keep the swing plane the same and don't do a motion to add topspin. Then the ball goes long and they wonder what happened.

 

[NextLevel]

I remember when an amateur friend of mine, who likes to review CNT videotape with his friends, came along with me to ask a high level coach friend of mine a question. The amateur friend's question was simple - he and his friends had found ways of looking at videotape and developing high level technique. However, they were having issues applying said high level technique in their matches. I had told my amateur friend a long time ago that there is nothing like high level technique that stands apart from the ability to read the ball and that if you cannot read the ball, you need technique that is adequate to the degree of uncertainty in your ball read ( more spin, less power) but that with practice against that quality of ball, your technique will become adequate to it. My friend said that okay but he wanted to hear different views on the subject. To cut a long story short, my high level coach friend gave my amateur friend a similar answer but just threw in more high level stories to support his position.

One of the interesting observations that my high level friend made was that my amateur friend seemed to be a very intellectual guy. He felt that my amateur friend may have fallen into the trap of trying to figure out or intellectualize table tennis. There's just to much about table tennis that you can't figure out without playing it at a level adequate to understand what is going on, and it is often hard/impossible to separate what was "figured out" from the practical execution of the stroke (you can't tell someone else to just do what you did and have them get the same result). It's the reason why it is often easier to get kids to play a higher level than adults once discipline issues are solved - the kids aren't trying to write a TT textbook like the adults are.

 

[Shuki]

Personally, I would have stuck with slow play keeping it low. You'll find balls to kill when they show up. Just vary things up like placement and amount of spin. Remember having more spin is often equal to having more speed. Spin and speed are both "more power". When playing balls that you can't attack that hard, more spin is usually the best option when attacking. But mix it up with less spin too. If they adjust to the heavy spin, and you just keep trying to make it heavier, you'll be screwed again.

 

[MasterMyself]

Yep NL, thats why I practised this tonight to get a feel of this stroke. It has a slow mo section at the middle of the video and I can see that my bat is not closed enough? but thats the best I can do for my skill level at the moment. Am I swinging my arm too far back? I kept telling myself to brush with my wrist and I did, but not very clear from the video. One thing I notice is my timing. I was too late to hit the ball on a number of occasions so I have to adjust it by starting my stroke movement once the ball bounces off the table. I know this may not be practical in a match play but at least what I can do during practice. Ok, have I done it right, or anywhere near what you describe?

Shuki - I have a tendency to play agg shot (maybe too risky) during match play. It would certainly improve my winning rate if I slow down in certain situation. This is something I have to improve on.

 

[NextLevel]

Yes, it is what I described - you may actually need to open the paddle more as you brush sometimes - I actually don't close the paddle when I Want to hit the ball hard if it has no-spin - any appearance of closing is forced by the ball height. My wrists are also quite a bit more flexible and whippier than yours .

Practice it on a no-spin ball to find the right contact point. And then you will see that you can hit the ball pretty hard if you find a contact point that doesn't hit the ball forward when you first make contact with the ball. Obviously, the lower the ball, the riskier this shot can be, but I know exactly what you are going through and I think your general attitude is the right one. You see a slow slightly high easy ball, and it looks easy, and you want to get the advantage in the rally. Spinning the ball safely seems like it gets the opponent off the hook as your level gets higher and I agree. It's all about calculation. Like I said, you can do this same stroke at different points on the ball and check the arc and safety and then use it whenever the ball is high.

 

[Ilia Minkin]

Yep NL, thats why I practised this tonight to get a feel of this stroke. It has a slow mo section at the middle of the video and I can see that my bat is not closed enough? but thats the best I can do for my skill level at the moment. Am I swinging my arm too far back? I kept telling myself to brush with my wrist and I did, but not very clear from the video. One thing I notice is my timing. I was too late to hit the ball on a number of occasions so I have to adjust it by starting my stroke movement once the ball bounces off the table. I know this may not be practical in a match play but at least what I can do during practice. Ok, have I done it right, or anywhere near what you describe?

Shuki - I have a tendency to play agg shot (maybe too risky) during match play. It would certainly improve my winning rate if I slow down in certain situation. This is something I have to improve on.

Nice forearm snap!