OOAK Table Tennis Forum

So first of all, I should point out that I am not playing in a very high league and I am 16 years young, so I am still playing in a boys team.
Basically I've been playing a standard offensive playstyle with the following bat since I've started to get serious about table tennis:

Donic Burn Off- | Tenergy 05 FX | Joola Energy Xtra

About 3 months ago, I was watching the finals of the German "Bundesliga" live in the stadium and I was fascinated about 2 players who both played modern defense. I thought about getting into that playstyle before, but I always struggled, because my coach doesn't really know how to practice with defensive players. Now I've informed myself in the internet for 3 days and I came to the conclusion, that I want to try out playing as a defensive player, because I really like the idea of being capable to force the enemy into certain situation but still being able to make points with offensive shots.

So I will try to describe how I want to play as a defensive player: I want to use my backhand for chopping and blocking, so mainly defensive stuff, but if possible I still want to be able to smash with my backhand. The forehand is not my main problem, because in theory, I could just keep playing the offensive rubbers which I played before due to the fact that I want to use my forehand mainly for turning the game with topspins. So in conclusion, I want to be a chopper who still has a bunch of offensive options.

So I got a few questions which result out of that question:

1. Should I use long pimps, short pimps or an inverted rubber for the backhand? I tried playing with an anti rubber, but I didn't like it that much and I've heard that short pimps are pretty good for both chopping and still having some other options on the table, but most defensive players still use long pimps on their backhand, why?
2. What is the difference between playing an inverted rubber as a defensive player and playing with pimps?
3. Would an Allround+ blade be my best choice with the description of my playstyle or should I keep going with the blades I already played as an offensive player?
4. So I thought about a racket setup that is not too expensive and I'm just wondering if that would be a good choice:

TSP Balsa 3.5 Def+ | Donic Vario | Gewo Return Chop

Thanks for reading through all of that

The great majority of highly ranked modern defenders play with inverted on the forehand and pips (usually long, but it's been pointed out recently that there is a fairly sizeable number of highly ranked women who play with short) on the backhand. So there is probably a good reason for this. I don't think it's for confusing the opponent, I can't remember ever seeing a high level player flub a return due to misidentifying the rubber used by the opponent. Rather it's because it's easier to return high level loops with pips. As for equipment.. perhaps the best blades to use would be the ones recommended by choppers on this forum, like the Joo blade. I suspect trying to chop back balls with a OFF+ blade would be an exercise in folly. As for the forehand rubber.. Joo chops very well with Tenergy, but...

Iskandar

If you simply want to get a feel for modern defense, just put some cheap LP on your BH and see how it goes. Either OX (no sponge) or 0.5 mm is probably better to start with. Since you did not like Anti, it's not a given that you will enjoy playing with LP either, they are kind of similar in a sense that they are VERY different from inverted, so you'll have to relearn quite a few shots.

Your current blade will do for this exercise, but in general defenders use slower blades since it makes it easier to return powerful shots. Again, pretty much any ~DEF blade is fine - popular options include Donic Defplay Senso, Victas Koji Matsushita (VKM), Joo Sae Hyuk (a.k.a JSH, quite heavy and faster than the rest).

One other advantage LP provides over inverted - much easier serve return.

On FH it kind of depends on what you plan doing there: if you plan to chop, then it's probably better to avoid max sponge, something like 1.8-2.0 mm is easier. I recently re-discovered Victas Vs>401, which is marketed as rubber for 'aggressive chopper', which I find to be pretty accurate. I had fun with Donic Baracuda, Bluefire M2, and Andro Rasant as well.

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USATT: 1807 | League: 1887