OOAK Table Tennis Forum

Well, I was aware it was not a simple question. Just because I've been trying to figure it out for myself and I have no answers yet. As my backhand becomes more stable, especially against backspin, I have more chances to play two winged game. Currently, if I play someone who is clearly better than me, like 1800-level and above, I commit to backhand more because I know they well jam me 90% of the time. When I play my level, especially when I want to win, I often over commit to playing forehands no matter what. You can clearly see it from the two matches I posted a few pages ago. The goal for the next tourney is to actually use my BH against backspin when playing U1600 event or something.

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Heming and I have decided to have a live Q&A session online. I imagine this will save Heming some RSI from typing. It will be done through Google Hangouts and we can have a few people join us live on a panel type setup, whilst others will need to type questions. I will host the session and ask Heming some questions. I'll give the panel the chance to ask questions and participate in discussion whilst the passive audience can type. The session will be recorded and it will be available on ttEDGE.com. I may put it on YouTube and Facebook, but I'm not sure yet.

The people who will have an option to join us on the panel are those who have contributed most to this forum/ttEDGE and those I've had the most contact with. I'll just have to make the judgement somehow if lots of people would like to be on the panel. If you would like to join us on the panel, PM/email me. NextLevel, consider your seat booked.

I'm hoping to find a time when people from the US and Aus can all be around for the session. Most ttEDGE members are in these locations. Can anyone suggest a time which may work?

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You're welcome

You're very welcome NextLevel. No need for an apology haha, its nice to hear other people/coaches' thoughts on the very same topics we talk about and also that we share the same/a similar view on this.

As a kid, I was taught from a young age to try and serve the ball short and look for a long push that I can spin the ball up slow and heavy against. This alone worked as a junior very well inside Australia but was certainly not good enough internationally. Even at the junior international level, I wasn't able to get away with half-decent services, lacking service returns and a limited set of game patterns in my game. Of course, my ability to deal with pressure wasn't very good but I generally didn't put crazy amounts of pressure on myself until I was about 18,19,20 years old.

Over the years, I have spend a lot more time in Europe. In china through the ages of 15-20, I was one of millions of players and certainly not one that the coaches and managers in province teams really cared about in terms of the results I achieve. So these years I didn't really have much strategy and I just hoped to be more consistent and better than my opponents. I was using normal pendulum services and didn't many plans after a serve, on what to do. Again, I was just hoping I was good enough to deal with whatever was coming next. Practicing so many hours a day and with pretty good players a lot of the time, I naturally became quite safe and solid both sides, and in the open rallies. I had many problems with service and receive.

After my 20's, I went to europe, where I was a relatively strong player in the teams that I played for in Swedish league (2015/2016) and German League(2016/2017). They have much smaller group sizes in training and I was able to get much more personal attention from other players and coaches in our training squads. I was taught a lot of specific strategies and mental mindsets to have during matches, by the other players. These were good players in the training squads who have been/are at high levels and know exactly how to deal with pressure, think in matches and play good strategies. Players such as Ovidiu Ionescu, Xu Hui, Robert Svensson, Aleksander Shibaev, Bastian Steger, Kirill Skachkov, etc.. Watching alot of these guys play matches, and even points in training with them I learnt so much. Then there are the many league matches that I had these years. As there were less players in training groups, I got to practice with these great players much more often that I would in China. This taught me so much, but I also learned about a lot about myself. I was still using my normal pendulum services and didn't many real strategies and it drove me insane in 2016/2017 in Germany when I had lost 9 league matches in a row and just simply could not figure out why. Brett remembers this exact moment when I was calling him so many times even though we were countries away and I was just having a very tough time there, mentally. My service returns had improved a lot and was already one of the best parts of my game, if not the best. There were many many reasons but one of them was certainly because I didn't have set plays with my services and the shot after, which is arguably the most important two things in table tennis. I put myself under enormous pressure every single time I had matches and not having good enough serves definitely made it worse, because I didn't feel like I could control the game that easily.

I started trying to copy the henzell service in practice, just for some fun never ever thinking that it would amount to anything worthy of being used in real matches. Eventually, I gave it a try in german league and started finally winning matches again. Especially when I have won matches with that service, my confidence grows with it. It became a serve I had complete control over and suited my next shot perfectly. I like to open first with a backhand and use this to set a rally or my forehand. As I played more and more matches, I realised I needed to be able to serve different spins and to different lengths(short, half long/long and fast), and placements with it. It has become my weapon and almost only option, for better or worse. I still put enormous amounts of pressure on myself these days, and probably will for the next decade or however long I choose to play Table Tennis for. The difference now is that I know I will feel very nervous all the time but know how to deal with pressure. Also, extremely important is that I have built in many set plays and strategies such as (serve tomahawk and attack strongly to their middle or down the line, serve tomahawk and spin the ball heavy if they push at me), etc. Having these gives me targets during points, putting my focus on the match, rather than the outcome of the point/match and just hoping that I win points somehow. My general thoughts in matches are to capitalise on my 2 serves and win enough points on the opponents serves.

I will finish by saying that every player is different and should try develop good serves that suit their next attack. Specifically try and think about what you like to do most after a service, and try to develop serves that will create chances for that shot. For example, I know William Henzell likes to use his backhand attack after service. I think from memory he said the tomahawk is great for this because the serve entices opponents to receive this serve to his backhand, exactly what he wants.

Hope this helps and answers your question

Yes, I started copying Henzell's Tomahawk services at around the end of 2016.

I made this transition because I needed a reliable serve that I could control easily and serve pretty short and long/fast whenever I wanted to. It also set up my next attacks and strengths after the serve, better than the regular pendulum serve. I couldn't control my pendulum services very well and they drifted half long and sometimes high, too much under pressure. This started to become a big problem for me as I started to play against better players.

Additionally, I most wanted services that were curving away against a right hander's short forehand side. Most players in the world, even many many good ones, have far more trouble receiving with their forehand side as opposed to returning serve with backhand, especially nowadays with the new backhand banana flick, as I call it. It is also natural that players, no matter what level will struggle more with returning serve with their forehand side, than backhand. In my opinion this is because you are closer the ball with backhand than forehand, when returning serve. This makes it easier to judge a serve, and control your receive. You are less likely to misjudge and misread a serve with your backhand because your whole body is closer to the ball, at least in my opinion. My pendulum services were just not curving away at an opponents short forehand side and was an easy serve to flick with the backhand banana.

At that point in time, I hated when people were playing backhand banana flicks at me. With the tomahawk, they would have to go all the way to the forehand side to banana flick at me, opening up their whole backhand side, allowing me to put the ball back to their backhand, with even just a block and they are most likely in trouble unless they are extremely good players. This is a tough ball for almost anyone in the world, to play a backhand banana flick from the forehand side and then try get back to the backhand and play even an ok shot. Me and Brett over these years have come across this A LOT. during matches, whenever I came up against someone who tries to backhand flick a lot (even If i serve a tomahawk short and curving away from them), me and Brett would pretty much always agree that I should just put the ball back to their backhand with a block and I'll be in control of the point, I can then pivot also if I wanted. There are many options I have done this well and right.

Therefore, you are absolutely spot on when you said that "serving short to the forehand is one of the safer places and while it can be flicked at least it makes people move". The only thing i will say is that if your serve tends to drift half long and you play against someone who picks up half long serves well and topspins it, it is probably a better option to serve short to the backhand. This way, they need to use run around to open up against your half long serve and can open up more opportunities on the table. However, if you serve to the forehand drifts long, your opponent can topspin without having to move. Just some food for thought.

With regards to the backhand serve I am currently sometimes using, it is another variation that also suits my game quite well. Again, it is something I've played around with over the years and didn't think I would use it under match and high pressure situations, but it has been quite useful. I use it when the tomahawk isn't being effective. Against most players, I will find that they either have more trouble with the tomahawk serve or the backhand serve, so its always good to have these options. The more options the better, in my opinion. It's something I wish I had more of, and definitely something Henzell wishes he had more of, internationally. I am currently working to try get my old pendulum services back, even if its just a variation, it can do me a lot of good, having those change ups.

Hope this answers your question and is easy to understand

No worries, glad to be here

I would say its always much easier if you have a coach who understands these things and has been there before and/or done it. Through experience, they know all about the feelings in a match, how to deal with it, how the match will make them feel(example faster heart, shaking hands, etc).

Playings lots of matches and lots of different people is always a huge help. Through the matches, you will be getting real match experience and eventually learn what is good, what is not good, etc. You will also get better and better at dealing with nerves.

So to answer your question, I would say yes. During matches, I am thinking to myself something very close to, "ok this guy is probably thinking this, he is good at this, probably not so good at this, what is he trying to do, what do I think will work?". It's very much like a game of chess. There are also times where I am thinking "Lets first play my game, use my strengths and see how he responds". Obviously if they respond badly and I get a lot of points doing what I'm doing, I'm gonna stick with the same tactics. If it doesn't win me so many points, thats where I look for other solutions and try to solve some problems

Hope that helps

Thanks for the response! It answered everything and more. I saw exactly what you explained when watching your matches. I started toying around with that serve last night, I'm pretty excited to have a new serve to work on again.

Well, isn't this a treat?

I actually just laughed out loud and how good Heming's responses are. My attention normally fluctuates when I read long post, but I'm kind of glued to every word.

I'm putting together a list of questions for Heming too. I think I have some good ones and I'm going to save them for the live interview.

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Having simply too many friends in Australia I've realized that pretty much any time after 3 PM PST during the summer is when they start waking up. That would be 6 PM on the east coast of the USA.

To improve this, Brett, you should fly to the USA and make the time zone situation easier for us all. Plus I hear BRS wants some training

Yes quite the treat. Keyboard injuries if he keeps this up...

What's wrong with the picture of a world class athlete suffering from keyboard injuries...

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"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

How long will the whole session last (at least planned to)?

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Say 1.5 hours

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Wow, so much great things happening, Brett is back and we have another pro on board, good times!

Seems like perfect time to ask a question about my recent struggles with third ball consistency and general dilemma whether to try to cover almost everything with my forehand or recover more neutrally and develop, rely more on my backhand.

Video of my FH third ball openers:

https://youtu.be/jt7KrepqxLw

Some general issues:
Recovering to close to the table?
Standing too straight?
Taking the ball too late when it almost passes me?
Cant stabilize my elbow in the golden point position for the life of me, it just keeps going over my shoulder height no matter how much I concentrate on it,any new ideas how to stop that habit?


Video of my backhand topspins after the serve:

https://youtu.be/tpgDAivzSSk

So, which of these approach has more potential and you would focus on if you were in my place?

Thank you for all the help!

From an non expert. Freeze your video on the ball contact. You are actually contacting the ball behind your body. So I feel you are totally correct in your statement about late contact. Your stroke has to go too vertical from this late contact from your bats starting point.
I feel until you correct your swing path to much more forward it will be impossible to have the correct elbow position.

Check out ma longs contact point. The stroke path is about 45 degrees and thus the contact point is much much more forward.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiARkUO6aEE

Some freeze frames. Picture 1 is just after you served. I believe your paddle is actually over the table at this point. I don't think you have a terrible stance here but lower would be better and your recovery time is lacking. Put weight on your forward foot and push back a little bit to get into a neutral position after serving.

On picture 2 we have the contact point. You know it's a good place to contact the ball (if you were further back) but you are so close to the table it results in picture 3 which is entirely off balance and just cannot have any power.

1. Recover faster, there's some TT edge videos on this, maybe BRS specific ones?
2. Get further back so you can swing forward.

Also you are just using your arm to hit that thing. The legs and body aren't doing much here. You should be bending down to your side deep and coming up like the teddy bear.

You should put the camera at the end of the table so you can see where you are standing in relation to the end of the table and have someone or a robot feed you deep backspin balls. Try to hit these balls using your legs and coming up in a more forward angle. I hesitate to say 45 degrees because it isn't always that simple. Try lighter and heavier backspin to understand why you need your legs and torso involved.

For me, with all of the TTedge videos I am just crushing these pushes. It's taken a lot of work but it's worth it because then you will never lose to someone who just pushes if you can attack these balls with power.