Want to improve need Feedback!

[latej]

My movement is sluggish because I don´t really move after my stroke and stand still and wait till the ball is on my side again. Like where should I move if I don´t know where the ball will come next. I have big trouble with that.

I think that's a bit of a misunderstanding. The point is not to "move somewhere" after the stroke but rather just to "move", like a very short jump-step, after every single stroke, so that you realize, it is not really "after" the stroke, but instead "part of" a stroke... Sometimes, during the match I tend to "forget" it and not do it, then people say "I'm loosing my feet"... This needs to be built-in, hard-wired... Makes a big difference, it's worth focusing on it...

I'd also say what others mentioned, you're not aggressive enough. Even though you think you are, you didn't yet reach the "ceiling" (popular word nowadays ;-) ) of your aggresivity, trust me. But that maybe part of your nature...

You're tall indeed, I was thinking, Patrick Franciska would be good role model. Did you see his match with ML in Singapore? There were many good matches but this one made the biggest impression and hope on me (and I can be considered ML fan).

Somewhere else you mentioned getting "low". That is good, but only if it is in connection with staying "wide". I think you should generally stand wider (I tell this to myself constantly too). This influences many things.

Since you live in Austria it would be nice if you too could come to the planned Germany TTD meeting. I certainly hope time will be right so that I can come too.

 

[Zezima]

Yeah a short jump after my stroke has finished could do wonders. Feets has to stay on the ground during the stroke which I dont seem to do many times(lifting my left feet up) also my weight transfer could be more forwards and for that I need more prep time and less going back too much with the racket.

I think I am wide enough if I go any wider then the movement gets even worse. I actually heard that somewhere that it impacts your movement negatively if you go wider than shoulder width. My ass has to get lower though. I feel like most times I am too close to the ball and with my long arms I can't do the stroke properly but thats a problem with anticipation and not moving properly -> giving them easy balls.

Where and what is that germany TTD about? Whats the reason to attend? I live very close to germany like 35min. But thats only the south part of germany. Up to north would be 11h or something. And I hate driving...

 

[jk1980]

the notion that you need to have a more narrow stand, so you can make a (ausfallschritt) step to the left or right is usually mirrored from old folks. They'll tell you that table tennis is the game of little steps which is true.
But if you watch all better players you will see that they have a very wide stance and they basically jump with both feet into position to the left or right and that is why they have that wide stance... these little jumps (one for recovery one to get in position) should be enough, especially for you, because if you add your leaning to the side a little you should be able to cover the whole table as a big player.

here you got two relatively tall players in a wide stance (and that is not even "chinese style" wide stance)

 

[latej]

Yeah a short jump after my stroke has finished could do wonders. Feets has to stay on the ground during the stroke which I dont seem to do many times(lifting my left feet up) also my weight transfer could be more forwards and for that I need more prep time and less going back too much with the racket.

I think lifting left foot when playing FH spin, can happen naturally, because you push from the right foot, so I wouldn't worry about it. Depends on the strength you use...

I think I am wide enough if I go any wider then the movement gets even worse. I actually heard that somewhere that it impacts your movement negatively if you go wider than shoulder width. My ass has to get lower though. I feel like most times I am too close to the ball and with my long arms I can't do the stroke properly but thats a problem with anticipation and not moving properly -> giving them easy balls.

I'd say, give it a try, wide open stance. I like @jk1980's answer and don't want to repeat.

Where and what is that germany TTD about? Whats the reason to attend? I live very close to germany like 35min. But thats only the south part of germany. Up to north would be 11h or something. And I hate driving...

Mannheim area. To meet and play, and if stars align, have a beer.

 

[Zezima]

I feel like they are much better at getting distance away from the table. Compared to them, I am very "static". Like when I have to go back I do a passive shot, while they go back to do an aggressive shot. They also commit more in to the shots, while I play safe and just try to bring it back on the table. So many chances to attack with my Backhand but I rather pushed back some even very high. Almost straight legs instead of bend -> also has factor that it doesn´t look like I am standing wide. Watching a better player play and myself on the other screen as comparison has opened my eye even more. Beeing high up instead of bending also takes away the confidence since I already know I am not ready to topspin that ball -> only passive blocks/lifting possible. So yeah not sure which exercise would help the most, but I have to work on that the most (bending the legs more)

Mannheim I don´t know it´s 4h away from me + having to pay for a stay I guess only 1 day? And just 4 Table it seems. How long would everyone play / whats the skill level / are we together the entire day? Other than that it looks like fun.

 

[Zezima]

Update:
These are the two players I played a couple of months ago again. Felt like I did a better job compared to back then.
This time I missed the ball entirely many times. Somehow didn't get the opportunity or maybe because of lack of practice couldn't really use my backhand flip at all. Looped 90% over the table (weird technique) my arm ends at upper chest height instead of all the way up to my left eye.
From what I have seen, I loop mostly with my arm and upwards. As if my lower body and upper body are not connected during stroke. Also feels like both games were winnable if I did just 10% less attacking errors.
Excited to hear your thoughts. Especially if someone saw my games 2 months ago against the same players!

vs Robert 0-3
vs Tobias (lp on backhand) 1-3

 

[kindof99]

A couple of points after watching your videos:
1. You keep reaching out to play/touch the ball, that will also cause slow time to recover. I think it will help to tucker your elbow in and contact the ball closer to your body.
2. You use too much of shoulder in your forehand. That might also be caused due to not waiting for the ball enough.

 

[kindof99]

I think you used your shoulder too much in the warm up as well, not just in the game. I would recommend do some body-only forehand drive to help using the body power properly.

Also your central part, belly and below , is a little too loose. This will also cause you not able to use the power from you legs and thus you need to use more of your shoulder and arm.

 

[Zezima]

I think you used your shoulder too much in the warm up as well, not just in the game. I would recommend do some body-only forehand drive to help using the body power properly.

Also your central part, belly and below , is a little too loose. This will also cause you not able to use the power from you legs and thus you need to use more of your shoulder and arm.

First of all thanks for your Feedback.

In the game against Robert I was warming up the way you said. Or do you mean something else? (First ~15sec)
I also really like my forehand in the Warm up. I don´t know about the shoulder because if I would use my shoulder I would feel it and eventually feel exhausted in my shoulder area no?
Even my backhand looks good in the warm up. I don´t understand why my stroke is so much different during the game. Pretty sure with the warm-up strokes I would win both games.

 

[kindof99]

First of all thanks for your Feedback.

In the game against Robert I was warming up the way you said. Or do you mean something else? (First ~15sec)
I also really like my forehand in the Warm up. I don´t know about the shoulder because if I would use my shoulder I would feel it and eventually feel exhausted in my shoulder area no?
Even my backhand looks good in the warm up. I don´t understand why my stroke is so much different during the game. Pretty sure with the warm-up strokes I would win both game

yes, I think you used too much of your shoulder in the forehand during the warmup.

 

[kindof99]

First of all thanks for your Feedback.

In the game against Robert I was warming up the way you said. Or do you mean something else? (First ~15sec)
I also really like my forehand in the Warm up. I don´t know about the shoulder because if I would use my shoulder I would feel it and eventually feel exhausted in my shoulder area no?
Even my backhand looks good in the warm up. I don´t understand why my stroke is so much different during the game. Pretty sure with the warm-up strokes I would win both games.

watched 51sec 52 sec in that video, you can see all your power for the loop comes from your shoulder

 

[gordonluvsu]

https://www.youtube.com/@TableTennisSkillsCHN/search?query=step

There are many good videos in here, you can definitely find something for yourself.

On PC you can auto-translate the subtitles to any language.

 

[jk1980]

i'd like to join in on that warming up discussion. I have seen only the warm up until now and i kind of agree that the looping part is not that bad during warm up, BUT the loops that do work out for you in the warm up are all from a lower stance. Now in your regular stance you stand up more tall, so what is the plan now inside a game ?

Do you want to stand upright and tall, move sideways to the ball, then lower your stance significantly to be in a good looping position to loop, then get upright and move laterally again ? Changing the height of your stance inside the game will do exactly this: "make you miss the ball outright", because if you are upright while you evaluate the ball flight path and then change your point of view by lowering your position only for the shot, then your whole prediction of where the ball will be is off by a few inches. so the hard truth is that you need to lower your stance while playing and moving significantly. Added benefit of this is that many more balls will look loopable to you know, since you are already in a better position to do so.

A few times i also think that the movement of your bat in terms of height is too little. So let's say your back swing has your bat be at 80cm from ground level and the end position after swinging through your bat is at 100cm from ground level. That is a very steep angle and makes the hitting window very small. Remember you can't hit it at the very beginning of the stroke and not at the very end of the stroke because at these times you either did not accelerate enough ore are not in top acceleration / swing speed anymore, so you end up having around 10 cm where you can hit the ball with a very closed blade.

 

[kindof99]

First of all thanks for your Feedback.

In the game against Robert I was warming up the way you said. Or do you mean something else? (First ~15sec)
I also really like my forehand in the Warm up. I don´t know about the shoulder because if I would use my shoulder I would feel it and eventually feel exhausted in my shoulder area no?
Even my backhand looks good in the warm up. I don´t understand why my stroke is so much different during the game. Pretty sure with the warm-up strokes I would win both games.

I think you can improve your forehand push as well. Robert mainly attacked your forehand. You had too much backswing in your forehand push. Your hand was out too early so the hand did not have support from the body when it contacted the ball. Push is supposed to be a point action and you did it like a long line to push. Your hand is way too far away from your body.

 

[dingyibvs]

First of all thanks for your Feedback.

In the game against Robert I was warming up the way you said. Or do you mean something else? (First ~15sec)
I also really like my forehand in the Warm up. I don´t know about the shoulder because if I would use my shoulder I would feel it and eventually feel exhausted in my shoulder area no?
Even my backhand looks good in the warm up. I don´t understand why my stroke is so much different during the game. Pretty sure with the warm-up strokes I would win both games.

The issues you want to fix are not from a lack of technique. Sure it can be improved, but the underlying problem is a lack of footwork. You feel a disconnect between your upper and lower body during games because you reach the ball with your upper body while your lower body lags behind at best and is in no position to contribute to the shot. This is the diagnosis, now let's talk about the fix.

Take the Robert game, at 6:23 he gives you a slow loop that's easily attackable and you have plenty of time to step around to attack it, but you weren't in position to do so. You should've hopped a bit back immediately after your long push, expecting a long return which will almost always happen at your level, and be ready to attack the return whether it's a loop or a push. If it's a strong attack then you'd be in a better position to defend as well.

The way to fix this is to run a drill. Your partner (or robot) gives you a short ball, you step in and push, then the partner/robot gives you immediately a long push back which you're to attack. This practices the in then out then attack movement.

This drill can be continued on to include a follow up topspin from a block/robot, which requires you to take another hop back and possible lateral movement to make the next shot.

This would be useful against the situation at 6:47. You made a loop but did not step back nor stay light on your feet, resulting in a block near your body to be returned very softly. You won that point, but a better player would've killed your weak return and you would've lost the initiative you seized with your successful opening loop.

If you find the drills I mentioned difficult, you can also start with something simple. When you practice your FH or BH loop, move in between every shot. Even if you don't have to move, do a little hop. This gets you used to being light on your feet, and every shot begins with lower body movement.

 

[Zezima]

i'd like to join in on that warming up discussion. I have seen only the warm up until now and i kind of agree that the looping part is not that bad during warm up, BUT the loops that do work out for you in the warm up are all from a lower stance. Now in your regular stance you stand up more tall, so what is the plan now inside a game ?

Do you want to stand upright and tall, move sideways to the ball, then lower your stance significantly to be in a good looping position to loop, then get upright and move laterally again ? Changing the height of your stance inside the game will do exactly this: "make you miss the ball outright", because if you are upright while you evaluate the ball flight path and then change your point of view by lowering your position only for the shot, then your whole prediction of where the ball will be is off by a few inches. so the hard truth is that you need to lower your stance while playing and moving significantly. Added benefit of this is that many more balls will look loopable to you know, since you are already in a better position to do so.

A few times i also think that the movement of your bat in terms of height is too little. So let's say your back swing has your bat be at 80cm from ground level and the end position after swinging through your bat is at 100cm from ground level. That is a very steep angle and makes the hitting window very small. Remember you can't hit it at the very beginning of the stroke and not at the very end of the stroke because at these times you either did not accelerate enough ore are not in top acceleration / swing speed anymore, so you end up having around 10 cm where you can hit the ball with a very closed blade.

Thats a good point I will check out during training games. But yeah thats what I have been doing I think. I loop once (usually the first one is good enough) then sometimes I have my weight at the back(when I had to loop a backspin ball) and then i straighten my body to get the body in a neutral position (away from having the weight at the back) and then the next ball comes and I go low again. So basically what you have told me. I would need to watch the video again how many times I am doing this in a match actually.
So basically my Forehand loop starts from lower position -> I go up while hitting the ball and try to shift the weight up and forward (usually more up than forward) which means my entire body gets "straight" after the stroke and I have to go low again.
I didnt quite understand your 2nd point with the bat height. I even feel like my stroke is too big sometimes. But here you are talking more about the height difference. Should my bat start lower? Because I have the problem to keep my bat high during the rally and hit the edge of my racket often because of this. Maybe you have an example for me in my videos?

 

[Zezima]

I think you can improve your forehand push as well. Robert mainly attacked your forehand. You had too much backswing in your forehand push. Your hand was out too early so the hand did not have support from the body when it contacted the ball. Push is supposed to be a point action and you did it like a long line to push. Your hand is way too far away from your body.

Gotta admit I barely trained last few weeks let alone pushing. I also tend to rather BH flick half long serves and only push if its very short and even then I just do a short touch back in those cases which I usually have a good feeling for. You can see sometimes I was serving to his forehand and then deep pushed into his backhand. Not sure how I didn´t end up doing it more often. Also I didn´t go for backhand rallys even though I know I have a much better backhand than him. Probably because he was playing more through forehand like you said, that I even lost the feeling to play backhand myself lol. Just watched 7:58 again and I hate myself for not looping even wider to his backhand and instead of gave him a free point to this FH (wanted a faster truls like ball to his wide fh which ended up high slow and bad placement)

10:19 I did a good backhand push I think
10:45 I also really like the tempo of my strokes here my movement is not perfect, but I see I did some little steps to the left and speed was enough to break him. Overall very controlled and calm.
14:42 Even watching that FH shot again in slowmo I don´t understand how that could go out. And one of the rare FH shots that I finished to my left eye. And even use my hips to rotate.
Most of my FH mistakes are going only to my upper chest.
When I got a long FH Ball I also didnt make any steps and I am just leaning to the right. Which breaks my entire center of gravity during the stroke and afterwards aswell.

So even though I thought I did some improvement compared to my last games (against Noah,..) this still looks really bad.
I will do some exercises where I get half longish balls entire table (not very fast ones) and try to receive it with my FH entire table - looping everything. That should help me with my movement making these small steps sideways - so I stop just standing still and lean sideways.
Also this video is insane. His Technique is so fking good wow.

And then I need to do a slower topspin exercise where I use my legs and upper body at the same time? Since they don´t seem very sync. Like sure I see some weightshifting and hip rotation but that doesn´t look all in one motion to me. Hard to explain.

 

[jk1980]

I didnt quite understand your 2nd point with the bat height. I even feel like my stroke is too big sometimes. But here you are talking more about the height difference. Should my bat start lower? Because I have the problem to keep my bat high during the rally and hit the edge of my racket often because of this. Maybe you have an example for me in my videos?

i made to depictions of a ball coming at you from the right.
The shifted rectangles symbolize your stroke. (blue image) If the stroke has a very shallow angle there are not many points at the flight curve of the incoming ball where you can effectively hit it and still make sure you hit it within your top arm acceleration.

(RED image) if you have a more steep angle (more upwards) there is more leeway because you can hit it at different points of the curve and still have good acceleration and a good quality ball.

TLDR: if you only hit from back to front you got a shallow angle and this will be very hard to make it work in a match scenario.
if you hit more from back down to upwards front you can hit the ball at more places inside the balls flight curve and still get good quality.

that was what i was trying to convey. when warming up the balls that you get are all slightly topspin (coming from a block) which enable you to play like you did, but inside the match the ball that you will want to attack will more often than not have backspin in it rendering that technique with a shallow angle harder (which then can result in you going for too much power and overshooting).

 

[Zezima]

i made to depictions of a ball coming at you from the right.
The shifted rectangles symbolize your stroke. (blue image) If the stroke has a very shallow angle there are not many points at the flight curve of the incoming ball where you can effectively hit it and still make sure you hit it within your top arm acceleration.

(RED image) if you have a more steep angle (more upwards) there is more leeway because you can hit it at different points of the curve and still have good acceleration and a good quality ball.

TLDR: if you only hit from back to front you got a shallow angle and this will be very hard to make it work in a match scenario.
if you hit more from back down to upwards front you can hit the ball at more places inside the balls flight curve and still get good quality.

that was what i was trying to convey. when warming up the balls that you get are all slightly topspin (coming from a block) which enable you to play like you did, but inside the match the ball that you will want to attack will more often than not have backspin in it rendering that technique with a shallow angle harder (which then can result in you going for too much power and overshooting).

Thats an interesting point. So what your saying is even with a closed angle you can overshoot. In a game when I overshoot I keep thinking that my racket angle was too open/stroke too upwards so I was thinking I was doing the red lines in your picture.
I need to figure out to get a powerful shot while hitting like the (red) stroke you draw. In the last video from this player he also hits it with a more open angle unlike me. I just need understand better what I am doing wrong when I overshoot. In my games I did the same stroke over and over again and didn´t know what to fix. And that loses me the confidence in my shots -> I am even less prepared when it lands on the table.

I wanna hit FH like this From what I understood in the video he does it all with hip rotation. I was focusing more on getting my weight on my right leg and shoulder down and hit the ball ball from down to up and "spin" it by hitting more with the Rubber and almost none with the blade. While when I look at this video it feels like he hits both with the blade and also still with the rubber aswell. That also explains why my balls would be slower most of the times but spinny (easy to block still)

 

[gordonluvsu]

Thats an interesting point. So what your saying is even with a closed angle you can overshoot. In a game when I overshoot I keep thinking that my racket angle was too open/stroke too upwards so I was thinking I was doing the red lines in your picture.
I need to figure out to get a powerful shot while hitting like the (red) stroke you draw. In the last video from this player he also hits it with a more open angle unlike me. I just need understand better what I am doing wrong when I overshoot. In my games I did the same stroke over and over again and didn´t know what to fix. And that loses me the confidence in my shots -> I am even less prepared when it lands on the table.

I wanna hit FH like this From what I understood in the video he does it all with hip rotation. I was focusing more on getting my weight on my right leg and shoulder down and hit the ball ball from down to up and "spin" it by hitting more with the Rubber and almost none with the blade. While when I look at this video it feels like he hits both with the blade and also still with the rubber aswell. That also explains why my balls would be slower most of the times but spinny (easy to block still)

The players from those videos are almost exclusively using chinese rubbers.
The technique is mostly the same, but racket angle and contact on the ball is not the same and should be done slightly differently with equipment like yours. ( G-1 and Rakza 7 ).

My setup is simlar to yours, except I have G-1 on BH and chinese rubber on forehand ( Rxton 9 = R9 ).
Looping the same incoming ball with G-1 and the R9 is quite different.
With G-1, I need to be more careful to not overshoot the table or create an arc thats too high.
Racket angle more closed, Hitting the ball more on its the upper side, Squeeze my hand tight right before hitting the ball to not release too much power.
With R9, I can do pretty much the same movement as the guy in the video.
Angle more open, hitting the ball more on its back, loose and relaxed motion and go allmost all out.

For training technique, even if it might seem slow at the start, the most effective and in also efficient way is to train 1 aspect intensely at a time.
Meaning that for the next 2-3 sessions, you only focus on 1 single part of your technique exclusively and let the rest be as it is.
It could be forehand upper body movement, and the next session footwork and steps.

Find exercises, multiball and simple exercises like serve -> return to specific spot -> loop -> blocks/random play.
These should target that specific aspect and allow you to switch between consciously trying to achieve it and subconsciouly making it a habit, because thats essentially what we are trying to do, create subconscious habits and automatic sequences out of a conscious effort and an idea.

Start slowly and make the movement conscious at the start with a correct form and then gradually make it more challenging.
What I keep in mind for this is essentially this:
"Repeat and do it so often and so well, until you can do it bored".

It takes some time, but it will definitely pay off and allow you to effectively increase your technique over a longer time span.

Hope it helps.

If you have more questions about how to really get better at learning and improving techniques and skills overall, just ask.
This topic was really a big struggle for me and after spending a lot of time researching ,thinking, contemplating and figuring stuff out, I have gotten to a point where I can teach and coach myself and others at my club quite well.