I think this forum will disillusion anyone very quickly.

Yeah, that's why there are only 6 people posting here. The rest wisely ran away.

Exactly! Handling a disillusion is hard. I myself stopped posting videos and turned to posting stupid jokes after being disillusioned.

Yeah, that's why there are only 6 people posting here. The rest wisely ran away.

- Playing matches is far better for me than training exercises. Exercises are for people who are learning stuff, so there is still a real need for them. I personally prefer to train myself during matches which is the best of both worlds for me.
- I'd be more scared of playing someone who is match tough than someone who has been doing lots of exercises.

While my practice partners don't loop the ball with a ton of spin or speed I'm finding it easier to counter loop as opposed to blocking the ball in. It's more consistent or seems to be? Is this some sort of tacky Chinese rubber trick? Passive block doesn't seem to work great at all - being somewhat active tends to work better but if I counter loop then it just goes in. This is assuming I can get a swing in.

With all of that said the people I'm working with don't really loop with power generally. Still it seems like this is opening up the door for baiting people to give a slower loop (half long balls?) and then attacking it.

I've been told to stop twisting my knees and waist and just to keep the bottom half of my body completely still during shots if I want to improve because it's not the right way to play anymore. Apparently it's how table tennis was 50 years ago. Thoughts???

While my practice partners don't loop the ball with a ton of spin or speed I'm finding it easier to counter loop as opposed to blocking the ball in. It's more consistent or seems to be? Is this some sort of tacky Chinese rubber trick? Passive block doesn't seem to work great at all - being somewhat active tends to work better but if I counter loop then it just goes in. This is assuming I can get a swing in.

With all of that said the people I'm working with don't really loop with power generally. Still it seems like this is opening up the door for baiting people to give a slower loop (half long balls?) and then attacking it.

Besides just playing matches, any drills that include a scoring system (or w/e) that are more match like?

For most players, blocking is easier than counter looping imo. If you find counter looping easier than blocking, then it makes sense to go for the counter loop because, in most cases, you can put the opponent in a more uncomfortable position.

Here's my own experience. In general, I tend to lose against players who can attack first and loop consistently. My current default is to block, which doesn't cut it against these stronger players. Hence, I recently started practicing FH counter topspins. To my surprise, it's not a difficult as I expected (at least in training when I know where the ball is going). I don't know if it's related to using a tacky Chinese rubber.

I've been told to stop twisting my knees and waist and just to keep the bottom half of my body completely still during shots if I want to improve because it's not the right way to play anymore. Apparently it's how table tennis was 50 years ago. Thoughts???

I'm going to comment about this in my next post, which may include some video about this or other unrelated (but table tennis related) things! Or maybe I'll split them Not sure yet!

Your "teacher" may also be interesting in helping the guy below too. He is also isn't keeping the lower half of his body still. Let's start a GoFundMe campaign to stop him from making this mistake!!!

It feels like there must be some context missing from the advice.