OOAK Table Tennis Forum

It will always bounce

Seriously: The rule I quoted above dictates that the ball touch the table, but has no requirement for the duration of that touch. "Touch" does not imply a percussive or transient event like "bounce" or "strike" does. Assuming the ball is continuously touching the table while moving across, I'd say returning at roll-off (or before) is legal.

Disclaimer: I am not a certified referee, and have not read any guidelines for referees (which is where this kind of situation should be covered).

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Rating in the middle/low range in the region.
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Yes true, it will always bounce. I guess I should have said something like 'it only bounces once'.

I don't know the correct answer to the problem but I found it an interesting one. It seems counter-intuitive that one would be allowed to legally return a ball that has (for eg) rolled a meter along the table. Perhaps an official umpire like retriever might shed some light on this.

The umpire would want to be absolutely certain that the ball did only roll and did not bounce at all. One of the clips that was shown recently of world class players showed an around the net shot where the ball didn't bounce to the height it would have if it had cleared the net, but it did bounce.

I did discuss this recently with a few Australian National & International umpires and the consensus did seem to be that if there was absolutely no bounce in this situation and the player had the presence of mind to wait till the ball rolled off the table and managed to play a shot that did not hit the edge of the table, that the ball had just rolled off, and landed in on the other side of the table then that would be a valid return.

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