Matches Season 2026/2027 Germany and Switzerland

[Zezima]

I will use this Thread to post my matches from this season. Also analyze what worked and what didn't. What I should be working on next etc.

Starting the season at 1600TTR in Germany
and B11 in Switzerland Elo 1220

Current Setup: Korbel + Rakza 7 Max bh and T19 max FH

 

[Zezima]

Didn't film the first round. This is a game from the 2nd Round in Germany.


1) I see some problems during rally that I am very bad at anticipating her shots especially when she was pressuring with her bh. I am only reacting and lifting the ball.

2) After looping one topspin (she has a very good block) I am not in position to loop again and then I am scooping the ball again. Last Season I did this mostly when the next ball fell shorter and I was standing in the back waiting. Here it seems like the length would be fine but I still don't loop it properly again.
There are many examples but here is one weird shot: 14:32. It's like I realize I had my racket angle too open and if I fully sent it it would go out. So I stopped my motion and it was neither a topspin nor something else.

Good examples: 14:47 something I have been practising in my training. Motion looks good. Very good spin. Also relaxed motion and not a super fast acceleration but a good 60-70% I would say.

16:10 I am just pushing to see who is more patient and how she reacts. Turns out she is quite nervous and kept pushing and did the mistake in the end. I was like this is boring tabletennis to win like this cmon loop it. And she said haha no you should loop it. I was like fk it if I am gonna lose I wanna lose with a longterm goal in mind. So I want to loop as soon as I feel comfortable. My older teammate told me he would have kept just pushing to win the match, he doesn't care how he wins.

negative:
Especially in the last set. You can clearly see that I struggle a lot from just blocking and driving and then transitioning into Topspin when I am close to table. 70% it's not even the time issue but mainly I don't have the feeling to topspin? Hard to describe it feels like I didn't play a topspin for 1h just took a break or something and now I would need to do warmup topspin strokes first to get the feel again. So I default back to drive and soft blocking. This is a very bad habit I want to get rid of. It's fine to win some points of off blocking but the way I block and drive just feels like we are playing a trainingdrill she attacks everywhere and I am the passive player whose goal is to just bring it back to the table. The feel of accelerating at contact when topspinning is close to 0 here.

17:43 I try again since the incoming ball was a weak highish push and then I freeze after my loop. Since I stopped attacking (Trust me I would attack again but during game it felt like I have no time) I lose a point that belonged to me. One of the bad habits of my weak trainingspartner + used to play with d09c so barely anyone could block that shot back to the table. Also I am facing much better players now so I need to get into my brain that I should always be prepared to loop twice and that one only is not enough most of the time now.

Also I am dropping my racket too much like 70% of the time or so. That also messes up with my strokepath I think. Since I am not fast enough to get the racket up high and then with a more closed racket angle hit it forwards. It always looks like I want to hit the ball at the very back and lift it up giving crazy high arc and then being scared to loop out so I am not accelerating into the ball. Against her I needed to hit more topspins forwards especially in the drive/block duels.

 

[Nash77]

IMHO - the most obvious thing, BY FAR, the jumps in my head when seeing this match is simple. It's not about technique or any specific type of shot - it's BY FAR about aggression (or lack their of).

I can't understand why you're playing so passive. It's like you're inviting her to attack most of the time, not putting her under any type of pressure. That will get you in deep trouble against any good player IMO. Anything else about this game is secondary to me. Any offensive player HAS TO dare to attack and play offensive minded shots, that's the basic of beating anyone good. The opponent won't beat themselves.

 

[Archosaurus]

I feel like if you had the mentality of attacking every above-net ball with more pace than spin, you'd probably have won the game. Almost every time you do that you immediately win the point, and I saw you win a lot of rallies just by going for it while she was fishing and blocking.

It's not a criticism of how you played or anything, just what I noticed.

 

[Zezima]

Here my match vs 1829TTR. We played 19 times and only this time I won vs him. Before I got only to 5th set which I would lose hard. This time magically I won 3-0.

Check out my bh in the beginning of 1st set. Also at 14:50 3 consecutive bh topspins starting from slow and then faster with wider placement on the 3rd one netting me the point. Also some really good blocks by me especially those wide to his fh after he opened up from the middle wirh bad stance.
15:13 and 15:30 aswell aggressive bh topspin. You can see at 15:30 I am leaning forwards not too bent since it's a higher ball. I just don't know if the technique looks good for consistency because my racket angle looks very closed. I just went with my gut feeling. My goal is just to replicate those type of shots more with a "safety" not relying on perfect timing.
17:05 looks good aswell didn't get rewardwd though
17:54 couldn't hold my laughter even though I apologized. He has 3-4 net/edges in every set we played for 18 games straight. But when I was in the receiving end he would laugh. Now it was my turn 😂

19:03 best point of the game (long exciting rally) Sadly I just wanted the point to be over quick. Not used to people bringing so many balls back like him. Even put one short to his fh since he doesnt like moving. He deserved it.

Overall it feels like I was a different player here. This game was 1 day after my league match vs Nina.

 

[Zezima]

Stupid me didn't realize I forgot my camera stative. Won my doubles and both singles 3-2 very close.

Can't analyze much without the video but:

1) I struggled vs backhand serve half longish to my fh (I kept looping upwards so it would go out or push the side he hit and it would go into the net) or miss it entirely trying to take it with my bh flick or fh.

2) I remember I did some nasty blocks against all out fh topspin where even I was suprised I brought it back and got applauded many times. Both of my Opponents had insane forehand topspins.
I should use this to my advantage more but it's hard since I have to predict and have almost no time vs these type of fh topspins.

3) I am using more and more my backhand topspin and win the rally. Especially after the 1840ttr player game I feel more confident to use it more.

4)a) Serve receive especially half long serves that I don't loop giving me troubles if they push it a tad too long. Either they miss or they hit a winner. Need to be more decisive and should do some multiball to get the feeling of keeping even half long sidespin serves short.

4)b) even if I returned their serve with an active stroke like bh topspin it wasn't enough. Eg. They do a backhand sidetopspin or tomahawk topspin into my bh. They know its gonna go to their backhand so they run around and finish with their fh. But if I place it to their fh they would also do the same. I tried and chopped the ball sometimes to vary it which worked but are there more effective ways? A good video about variation of serve returns that I can try is needed. Not those basic ones.

5) Need to practise more open up and then free(to my side) but I have to loop the ball no matter where he blocks. Sometimes I don't keep on looping so this needs to get out of the system.

6) not sure what to do with my serves. I just serve same sidespin serves but with a backhand serve motion, as hook , and as reverse pendulum. I feel like if I focused on a few only my serves would get much more controlled and better. But my opponents struggle if I do the same spin with reverse pendulum for example. Sometimes I feel like I want to attack immediately without having to need to turn around and get in position so I do the backhand serve instead. Also if they get used to it I want to confuse them and add some hook serves wide to bh and short to their fh. But quality wise they are shiet good enough for them to not attack though. Will ask the nati b coach in 2 weeks what he thinks about it.
I just hate the normal pendulum serve if all they do is cutting no matter what I give them. If I give them sidetopspin and they cut it I am stupid to read what spin the ball has and how I need to hit that ball without fucking it up.


That's it for this week.

 

[jk1980]

especially after having a look at your game against the 1829 TTR player i think you are on a good track regarding realizing little tidbits that you could do better.
I know we all want to be the great attacking ma long, but if we are really honest, that is probably not the most successful way for most of us.
You want to be more aggressive, loop all long serves, be the one on the attack, but tbh you would probably have way less success. I would not have guessed it but it seems like using what god gave you which is a tall physique is enough to even win against quite good players it would be stupid to let this go. If your most successful game is to just fish the openings and loops of the opponent from afar than that is what you are "good" at. You are way better in it that being the one that powerloop kills the first long serve to your forehand. Sometimes you block back, sometimes you backhand loop, often you just bring the ball back with the forehand one sometimes if you feel like it is the right ball you attack it from distance. this seems to be exactly the way to be successful for you. Of course attacking the opponents serves that go long would be putting them under pressure, but let's be real: Your close table loop is not good enough to do that even. you'd overshoot the table 80% of the times and gift the opponent easy points that they dont need to work for. Even coming to a level where you are able to reliably destroy long serves with a loop is very difficult because of the varying spins one can expose you to when serving.

It is remarkable that somehow even the better players struggle to find a way past you and there were quite some rallies where they tried hard for 3 or 4 attempts. Seeing that these are also not professionals that may be good enough to win points at that stage, so why change that ? the only thing that can bite you in the ass is if you gain weight and age and are not able to play that fishing game anymore due to physical constraints.

 

[Archosaurus]

especially after having a look at your game against the 1829 TTR player i think you are on a good track regarding realizing little tidbits that you could do better.
I know we all want to be the great attacking ma long, but if we are really honest, that is probably not the most successful way for most of us.
You want to be more aggressive, loop all long serves, be the one on the attack, but tbh you would probably have way less success. I would not have guessed it but it seems like using what god gave you which is a tall physique is enough to even win against quite good players it would be stupid to let this go. If your most successful game is to just fish the openings and loops of the opponent from afar than that is what you are "good" at. You are way better in it that being the one that powerloop kills the first long serve to your forehand. Sometimes you block back, sometimes you backhand loop, often you just bring the ball back with the forehand one sometimes if you feel like it is the right ball you attack it from distance. this seems to be exactly the way to be successful for you. Of course attacking the opponents serves that go long would be putting them under pressure, but let's be real: Your close table loop is not good enough to do that even. you'd overshoot the table 80% of the times and gift the opponent easy points that they dont need to work for. Even coming to a level where you are able to reliably destroy long serves with a loop is very difficult because of the varying spins one can expose you to when serving.

It is remarkable that somehow even the better players struggle to find a way past you and there were quite some rallies where they tried hard for 3 or 4 attempts. Seeing that these are also not professionals that may be good enough to win points at that stage, so why change that ? the only thing that can bite you in the ass is if you gain weight and age and are not able to play that fishing game anymore due to physical constraints.

It's not really ignorable that this kind of style is working against objectively good players. I just wonder if 1800 TTR players have an issue with it, but 2000 TTR would put them away and it'll become a wall.