OOAK Table Tennis Forum

Note to Brett:

I hit exactly one perfectly coordinated bh last night, in 29 sets. The quality difference from a fraction of a second better timing must be 200%. My opponent didn't even move before the ball was by him.

Iirc I hit one at Trolley last week too, in 10 or 12 matches. One perfect bh a day seems to be my limit atm.

Once again I'm coming back from a league match disappointed with my mental state while playing.

I played in the 4th division in the south of Sweden today. Usually I play in the 3rd but our coach thinks it's good for me to get as much playing experience as possible. First match I lost 2-3 to a guy ranked 100 points below me. I thought I played well overall but missed some easy shots and received poorly. Bit disappointed considering how active I was while the other guy was for the most part blocking me around. But it just shows my placement needs to improve.. or that I need a bit more spin on my open ups.

Second match I went 0-2 down to a guy about 900 points below me.. I was just missing everything. When it goes this poorly it's as if I stop playing, it's ridiculous.. my energy just vanishes. Despite the horrific first two sets I managed to win the next two and struggled a bit in the fifth but took it 11-7. It just shows how unstable my game can be.. it's quite a common occurrence that I lose the first set to much weaker players and I don't know how to overcome it. I'll just randomly snap out of it and play how I "should" be playing. My opponent was loving it, and tried to capitalize on my poor mental state. It's a shame I have to let it get to me, in these moments I just want to stop playing and give the game away. I feel guilty for just saying that, sadly that's how it feels in the moment.
I play to have fun and this isn't fun, even if I end up winning in the end. Of course there's no hard feelings, he's just having fun trying to win. Either way, I need to figure out a way to get myself out of this mental grave I'm digging for myself in these moments. Or perhaps it's just a part of my play style and I'll have to accept that I'm still not that steady. Nevertheless, this was an unusually poor performance.

Third match I played a guy ranked higher than the last one but probably a few hundred points below me. I had a much easier time against him and beat him fairly comfortably 3-0. It's strange how things go.. even stranger that I'm so concerned about it, just play and have fun and accept that it can't go my way always.. it's not like I'm playing to make a living or anything.

I really should start recording all of my matches so I can look back to see if my thoughts after each match really are accurately portraying each match. I don't like having a camera on me while playing but it's a silly hurdle to get over and could only benefit me in the long run.

I apologize for this sounding like a personal blog post lol. What have your guys experiences been like playing much weaker opponents and suffering losses or near losses?

I have sort of given up on the reverse pendulum and now using a Henzell like tomohawk/punch almost exclusively, with a backhand serve thrown in the odd time.

There is really no benefit to learning more variations than that is there? If one has more quality than the other.

I have to admit I am quite lazy when it comes to visualizing. For me, it may take a lot of mental effort to visualize all those thing Brett outlined above. I probably have to practice it so that it will be easier in the future.

What have your guys experiences been like playing much weaker opponents and suffering losses or near losses?

The list looks daunting but the reality is easy.

If you aren't doing those things, what are you doing? Thinking about winning/loss? Getting angry/nervous about the last mistake? Thinking about all the prize money you are about to win/lose? USATT points? Who's watching you? The score?

My experience was that I cannot categorize tournament players as "weak" anymore... I've been in numerous situations when I saw a player whom I thought I could beat easily, and lost 0-3 without any chances. It does not matter how I judge, by their technique, playing style or ratings, it is all very misleading. Maybe you are a high level player, and it is different for you, but my experience is the following.

I often meet people with random strokes who cannot return three balls on the table during the warmup. Yet it turns out they have tricky serves and somehow put the ball on the table from unbelievably difficult positions many times in a row when playing the actual game. Playing these guys was a hot topic in this thread not a long time ago. I struggle against them a lot.

Ratings are even more misleading. Just imagine a kid who is low-rated, but his last tournament was two years ago, and since that time he has been practicing with a former Chinese provincial player 5 times per week Or some local sandbagger who dropped rating on purpose so that he can grab the laughable cash prize in your event. Or an actual solid player who just played one tournament and got a very low rating as a result of some random things.

None of those guys are weak, though it is easy to categorize them as so. Anytime I face an unknown player, I try to not think about them as weak to not create expectations of an easy win and then panic when things don't go my way.

When I am to serve, I try to recall which serves my opponent returned poorly, or at least had predictable returns. Then I think about what my follow-up shot should be based on my current condition and the quality of the return. If my opponent serves, I remind myself that I will likely have an opportunity to loop it and should go for it; I also decide if I should pivot or not. There are many other things I think about (like not being distracted by excessive celebrations of the opponent and so), but I do not actively visualize them. I try to predict my opponent's possible returns, but I don't close my eyes and imagine that particular return and myself killing it for a winner. Maybe I should.

The above are some of the distractions everyone faces. No one is capable of blocking out these thoughts. No one is capable of blocking out any thought, as a matter of fact. The key is to allow these thoughts and then just do some of the between-point stuff I described.

Never underestimate an opponent who is fired up and wants the win. Sometimes people can play within a wide range. The bottom of their range may be 1400 and the top may be 1800, depend on their state of mind.

Yes, and playing against a "weak" opponent who suddenly starts playing well can lead to the worst panic episodes in table tennis ever. Just imagine that the score is 4-4, the "weak" opponent hits two winners in a row just because of luck, then he wins a point by hitting an edge, then you miss an easy smash. The score is 4-8, the "weak" opponent is on the roll, and you don't know what to do (even the net and edges play for him!). A lot of people mentally collapse in this situation, and I've been there too.

What have your guys experiences been like playing much weaker opponents and suffering losses or near losses?

My experience was that I cannot categorize tournament players as "weak" anymore... I've been in numerous situations when I saw a player whom I thought I could beat easily, and lost 0-3 without any chances. It does not matter how I judge, by their technique, playing style or ratings, it is all very misleading. Maybe you are a high level player, and it is different for you, but my experience is the following.

I often meet people with random strokes who cannot return three balls on the table during the warmup. Yet it turns out they have tricky serves and somehow put the ball on the table from unbelievably difficult positions many times in a row when playing the actual game. Playing these guys was a hot topic in this thread not a long time ago. I struggle against them a lot.

Ratings are even more misleading. Just imagine a kid who is low-rated, but his last tournament was two years ago, and since that time he has been practicing with a former Chinese provincial player 5 times per week Or some local sandbagger who dropped rating on purpose so that he can grab the laughable cash prize in your event. Or an actual solid player who just played one tournament and got a very low rating as a result of some random things.

None of those guys are weak, though it is easy to categorize them as so. Anytime I face an unknown player, I try to not think about them as weak to not create expectations of an easy win and then panic when things don't go my way.