New Rule: Opportunity to coach between points!

[Reaper]

Yes, Fan Zhendong looked pretty lost without a coach when Ma Long used effective tactics against him today ...!

There can't be coaching in that case because both players have the same coach

 

[Rory]

Coaching In between each point seems a bit much.i guess it depends on How long will they be allowed to coach?
I just played a tournament with two friends yesterday and we were in different event so we agree to help coach each other. There were times when we wished we could give advice mid game. Nothing long, just stuff like, stop pushing....attack the wide FH.

 

[Der_Echte]

Remember Jason Kidd's spilled drink delay tactic last season while he was still with the Bkn Nets?
LGL is probably the next to do it XDDDD

You are all thinking of the wrong place to spill a drink, the drink should be spilled on the UMPIRE, that would delay the game considerable.

 

[Excalibur]

Has ITTF officially said that this rule will come in to play, or are we soly relying on this leaked e-mail?

 

[brabhamista]

Has ITTF officially said that this rule will come in to play, or are we soly relying on this leaked e-mail?

It's not leaked information. The decision was taken at the BoD meeting during the WTTC.
The pdf is publicly available and can be found here: http://www.ittf.com/World_Events/wttc_2015/AGM_BoD/2015ITTF_AGM-BoD_EN.pdf

Here's the info from page 117 including the rationale for the decision.

------------------------------------------------------------

Proposed by the German Table Tennis Federation
To amend 3.5.1.3:


3.5.1.3 Players may receive advice only during the intervals between games or during other authorised suspension of play, and not between the end of practice and the start of a match; if any authorised person gives advice at other times the umpire shall hold up a yellow card to warn him or her that any further such offence will result in his or her dismissal from the playing area. Between rallies persons who are authorised to be at the bench / field of play have the possibility to give verbal and visual coaching instructions.

My note: Red wording has been removed and green wording added to the rule.


Rationale:
Connected with the aim to bring more emotion into our sport the German Table Tennis Association (GTTA) started tests of different coaching rules in the highest two league divisions beginning three years ago. The background and the idea of these tests was to create more action and emotions at the field of play during the matches and was born after discussions with different TV experts. Important is that it was not the intension to generate or to support some kind of poor behaviour in the courts but sometimes our sport seems too calm and unemotional. After the test run in the first season we made hundreds of interviews with the involved players and coaches as well as with the spectators of the league matches. As a result of the these interviews we modified the new coaching rule slightly and after two more seasons of testing we passed the rule as proposed in the rules of these leagues permanently as it was a big success. In addition to the already named groups of players, coaches and spectators the umpires made very good experiences with the new coaching rule, too. As they do not have to put their focus on prohibited coaching between the rallies they are able to put even more focus on aspects as the services etc.

 

[brabhamista]

Interestingly enough the rule doesn't set any clear limits to the coaching except that it's allowed "between rallies". That's loose enough to stretch considerably. Likewise there are no clear instructions for the umpires as to what constitutes "excessive" or "disruptive coaching", nor how they should deal with it. It'll be interesting to see how this develops.

Personally I'm not sure I like it. Table tennis already has a team event and this will in a way make the individual events into more of the same, IMHO. There's a big difference between cheering and coaching and I think I'd prefer no coaching at all, even in-between games, like in tennis. That way I feel it would truly be a contest between players as opposed to a contest between a player/coach team.

 

[Olio]

Between rallies mean basically a coach can call his player and tell him something very quickly so the opponent won't hear.

As long as it's within the imparted time (can't remember how much we have between points), that would be OK. So we're talking potentially a large amount of small timeouts.

I wonder how that would be enabled in local leagues, where there are no timeouts (and the umpire can also be the coach!)

British League matches will also take a lot longer.

It would have made more sense if they kept it to every 6 points, same as the towel time (like in tennis Davis Cup where the captain can talk to the player when they sit down)

 

[Blodgetts]

Absolutely terrible rule.
We already have between game coaching and one time-out per player per match. That is enough. Players should think for themselves and focus without all the added distractions. Can you imagine this in tennis? We will have to endure shouting matches between coaches after every point. It will be bad for the players and disruptive to watch. What's next? Coaching DURING points? Coaches on the court? Coaches holding their players' bats for them? Tag team wrestling disguised as table tennis? There have been enough rule changes already, and some not for the good of the sport. ITTF - please stop!

 

[mahomedy13]

I dont like this rule.There will be too much of a mid game disruption between points. i think making 2 timeout is a better option,instead of allowing coaching between points.

on the flipside,it may make the game better,but i doubt it.

 

[superduperlooper]

I personally think this a terrible rule, table tennis is a physical sport as well as a mental sport. Players have to be able to figure things out for themselves, and not just rely on a coach.

 

[raazzz]

Looks like some people is really disappointed, shouldn't they let us TTD member stand for the voting? Dan can you fix this?

 

[brabhamista]

In reality I think there will be a lot less disruption and coaching than we think there will be.

The limiting factor will be the player playing and being coached, IMHO. How much information can he process without losing focus and concentration? That will be the key, but by just looking around me at players in my league, I'd say the majority of players struggle to concentrate properly as is. They are already disturbed by noisy halls and they'd certainly be pretty peed off by being coached every second point.

I think the rule will be fine and we'll probably hear players tell their coaches off. Perhaps Kimi Räikkönen can show us a thing or two about handling being overcoached ;-)

 

[Michal_Z]

Hmmm..
Well I have been thinking about this rule and guess what I found out?
But this is just my opinion, probably not just mine, but.. here it is:

This kind of coaching I would allow just for TEAM competition, because this binds the team better together.
But for individual competitions I would not allow it. This is why it worked in german league, because it is a TEAM competition. But for individual tournaments this will not be very good I think
Coaching system in the tournaments it quite fine and doesnt need any changes.
For the teams, this can be a very good change ;-)

 

[TTHopeful]

Interestingly enough the rule doesn't set any clear limits to the coaching except that it's allowed "between rallies". That's loose enough to stretch considerably. Likewise there are no clear instructions for the umpires as to what constitutes "excessive" or "disruptive coaching", nor how they should deal with it. It'll be interesting to see how this develops.

Personally I'm not sure I like it. Table tennis already has a team event and this will in a way make the individual events into more of the same, IMHO. There's a big difference between cheering and coaching and I think I'd prefer no coaching at all, even in-between games, like in tennis. That way I feel it would truly be a contest between players as opposed to a contest between a player/coach team.

It is such a vague statement in the rule, you are right. This rule could cause all sorts of problems I think. Maybe it worked in the German League, but in other cultures and areas, tournaments, leagues it may not. Bizarre rule.

 

[mahomedy13]

Hmmm..
Well I have been thinking about this rule and guess what I found out?
But this is just my opinion, probably not just mine, but.. here it is:

This kind of coaching I would allow just for TEAM competition, because this binds the team better together.
But for individual competitions I would not allow it. This is why it worked in german league, because it is a TEAM competition. But for individual tournaments this will not be very good I think
Coaching system in the tournaments it quite fine and doesnt need any changes.
For the teams, this can be a very good change ;-)

This is a good point.it makes a lot of sense

 

[Michal_Z]

But how can we provide this point to the correct authorities?