OOAK Table Tennis Forum

Call me a moron, but I've seem to hit a brick wall in terms of using my Globe 888 in 2.0mm sponge. I just can't find a way to win with them.

If I block and take the pace off the ball, my opponent inevitable drives it at full speed past me, due to the lack of spin.
If I attack with it, although there is almost no spin on the ball, the sheer speed of it allows it to be easily countered and flat hit back at full pace.
I can't spin too well with them, nor can I produce reversal.

How am I supposed to win? I step around to use my forehand, but it's not physically possible for EVERY ball, and I eventually get pinned on my backhand by A graders...especially those that mainly serve and flat hit.

I've ordered a sheet in 1.8mm and one in 1.5mm, but I play off the table a lot in forehand exchanges and again I'm pinned on the BH eventually.

So how do I win? Or is there a barrier where players wanting to actually compete at a higher level must change to a faster SP in order to out gun the opponent?

P.S.: I read in the SP forum that you should win with speed first, placement second and weirdness/reversal a distant third. If that's the case what's the point of using MP in the first place?

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(='.'=) But there's no sense crying over every mistake,
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Gek, I have an opinion on this, but it is only my opinion. Others may disagree.

My feeling is that MP is limited in the level that it can be played successfully to. I played with reasonable (but not fantastic) results with MP - C7 more specifically, back in the days when I played in B3 division. Quite a low grade in our club. It gave me enough reversal to be useful there, it gave me enough hitting power to put away the occasional BH drive/smash. And it blocked well enough to keep me in rallies and maybe get away a good FH to win the point. I changed away from it when I went into B2 mainly because I felt I didn't have enough control over it staying on the table as I would send it long too much. Wanting something slower I went back seeking it in LP. I think this inadvertently assisted my level improvement by more than just finding a slower rubber to keep on the table more. MP does a bit of what SP can do, but not as well, and a bit of what LP can do, but not as well. I think at lower levels you can get away with it. At higher levels I don't know anyone who plays with MP. I tried another MP for about half an hour (Meteor 845) between B2 and going up to B1 at the end of 2009/start of 2010. I discovered against my mate who was about to start playing A5 and who I was always competitive with using Meteor 8512, I had next to no weapons on my BH. I ripped it off immediately. Can't see myself ever using MP again. I think you need to choose to go real dark with LP or less dark with SP. What I will suggest is to give Pogo a go. Its got something of an MP feel in an LP, so it maintains the LP weapons of more spin variation, some reversal, good chop blocks, can hit with it, etc.

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I'm always in the dark, but the Dark sheds lights upon everything!! Beauty is only pimple deep! Beauty is in the eye of the pipholder!
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The most successful MP players I've seen are all women. You can see Miao Miao using MP take down some of the top Aus men in this thread. viewtopic.php?f=35&t=12208&start=0

This is the blueprint of how it's used successfully at high levels.

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My whole set-up costs less than a sheet of Butterfly Dignics

Block positively with the MP and vary the spin / reversal to produce tentative balls from the opponent which you can then put away with your monster forehand.

Easier said than done...

Gek,

I'm not sure what level you're playing at but an MP like 563 can be (and is) taken to 2200 and beyond by players that I know. Thinner sponge, i.e. 1.5 or 1.8, is actually more deadly than 2.0 which tends to play more like inverted. The trick is to introduce variation in spin without telegraphing how much spin you're actually imparting. 563 1.5mm is very effective at this, with many opponents' returns going into the net having misjudged the amount of topspin on the ball (and having so little time to prepare for the return). Attacks with such rubber are low, flat, and lightning fast which makes me wonder what level you're playing at if your opponents are counter-hitting such balls with ease!

The most effective attacks with a rubber like 563 use a flat, rolling stroke; not a brush or drive stroke like inverted. Use an inverted stroke with MP and you're back to playing with a semi-spinny inverted. I campaigned 563 for a few months -- and play against MP players every week -- but found serve return with it to be my undoing.

I am talking from perspective of much lower level of play, but I can also confirm that thinner sponge MP is the one which is better, because of its control, lower speed and better spin kill (or reversal if it can be produced). blocks need to be controlled and kept low and slower to be unpleasant to opponent, just like return from LP is not fast, but falling. so you can produce falling ball which is harder to attack consistently and risky to drive. also the attacks need to be direct just as nathanso described, to produce low, flat and fast ball. at higher level spin variation is a must. I can recommend using of 1,5 mm MP or thinner, but you can see that you must develop certain style of play to be effective with MP

Stop trying to be MM, rip it off and come back to the lightside?

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Chasse Patate

+1

...or get tips from the short/medium pips section. Prepare for the worst for retooling and reprogramming.

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Viscaria. H2 Neo 2.15. Tenergy 05 1.9.

@Reb: My LP skills are less than ordinary. I can get chops on, but I've got very little over the table tricks so I think MP is as dark as I can go haha!

@MNNB: A lot of the women I watch have strange yet safe backhand styles. Both Miao Miao and Fukuhara Ai use that brushing stroke whihc I suppose give them so much variation, whereas my BH is a pure flat hit. I might have to modify my stroke.

@Algernon: I find blocking positively gives my opponent too much topspin and I get it slapped past me. But that's my current strategy.

@nathanso: This is actually against my dad, a mid B-grader penholder at best, but he practices against me a lot and has no trouble with my pips or blocking my FH (purely because he knows where I'll hit and the spin I'm producing). But I have a pretty solid MP stroke according to my coach, and I'm hitting them flat.

@friendship: I'll definitely try thinner sponge before giving up.

@silver: I actually coached someone last weekend and had to play an inverted BH, although I can rip the ball, I'm still having a load of problems returning serves (the real reason I gave up on inverted...after losing my first couple of games in B grade when I got back to TT).

@Yuzuki: actually I have a more pure stroke than my coach who uses 802-40. But he hits so much faster because he's using an SP. Gah! So frustrating!

_________________
(\__/)
(='.'=) But there's no sense crying over every mistake,
(")_(") You just keep on trying till you run out of cake.

@gekogark: you say you are a true BH flat-hitter and the reason for pips is serve return? I am familiar with this as serve return was main reason I started with pips. did you try short pips? i find successful SP designs easiest for precise serve returns and they are certainly best for flat hitting

@friendship: yes i initially started using pips for serve return, and i've always had a punching BH stroke. I have tried SP before but didn't like how there wasn't enough sink. But i use SP differently. With SP i focus on speed, but with MP because i can't be sloppy texhnique as it'll land in the net, so I focus on consistency and angles.

_________________
(\__/)
(='.'=) But there's no sense crying over every mistake,
(")_(") You just keep on trying till you run out of cake.

from my experience I can say is that it depends on type of SP rubber. modern SP's tend to be with maximum spin, sometimes the throw angle is closer to inverted (higher) as well. but there is other type of SP which is with less own spin and of course less sensitive to incoming spin. such rubber should be tsp spectol 21 (didn't try it yet personally), first choice of amateur league attackers in my country (I think pro's here all use inverted). since its less sensitivity to spin it is ideal for attacking but so is for serve return, and also attacks which such rubbers produce are flatter with lower trajectory and certainly more sinking than with spin type of SP's, although MP's balls will certainly be more unpleasant

I played recently some matches against older player who uses MP on FH. very unpleasant attacks which made me use different more flat stroke to counter, similar to LP's hit. but this guy uses thinner sponge

@friendship: Thanks for the advice! I've actually spent the day reading through the Chinese forums on pips (and I thought OOAK was big in this regard!) and will probably want to try:

-Armstrong Attack 8 Super version 43 degrees
-TSP Spectol Speed 45 degrees
-Spectol 21
-563-1 (I didn't like 563, but people are raving about it...kinda like T05 and Hexer to me)
-Baxster F1A

But firstly I'll see how I adapt to either 1.5mm or 1.8mm sponge against Monkey tomorrow night. We should be filming so this is gonna be interesting for sure!

_________________
(\__/)
(='.'=) But there's no sense crying over every mistake,
(")_(") You just keep on trying till you run out of cake.

nice, it will be interesting

I played with 563 2.0 on standard sponge (softer feel) which I've got years ago from zeropong, and it was strange to me and hard to control, although it had something like spin reversal which was unpleasant for lot of players. it is quite possible that properties are specific to batch since 563 1.5 from zeropong behaved quite differently, much more easier to control. I've never played with 563-1. played with kokutaku 119 1.5 mm chinese sponge and found it easiest to attack with from all three rubbers, although little different because of springier sponge. I am using it right now on one setup and I am still learning how to block high arc slower loops with it, but this is my technical bad as well

I will try next week SP kokutaku 119 1,5 mm chinese sponge I got from eacheng these days. I will aslo try MP kokutaku 110 1,2 mm chinese sponge, got this one also (nathanso promised to report on this rubber since he liked in very much on first touch). I will report my observations on these rubbers within couple of weeks...

A couple of years ago I tried the Peacekeeper OX medium pip, and at first I thought it was great. But once I started playing better players, I found that it was neither deceptive enough to cause them problems or fast enough to hit through them. Maybe it was the pip or that I am not skilled enough, but it just seemed like a compromise between long and short that wasn't really exceptional at anything. That's why I will likely not try any medium pips any more either.

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"The greatest teacher, failure is"
USATT Rating: 1725
Blade: Stiga Cybershape Carbon
FH Rubber: Butterfly Tenergy 19 2.1
BH Rubber: Dr Neubauer ABS3 1.5