I was playing a really good player yesterday from the club. He seemed (like many people seem to do) to move me from side to side.

He did this even hitting shots which are relatively lower percentage (but quite safe).

His basic strategy seemed to hit to the forehand. Open up the backhand. Then hit a shot to the backhand.

I chased down a lot of balls but lost the first set 6-3. It wasn’t all bad news. I played some really tight games and one a few of them.

In the second set, he quickly got up 4-2 but then I came charging back. I started to hit more down the line backhands some of them for clean winners. But in the end I lost 6-4.

In re-reading your strategy ebook, I realized that he was employing a basic strategy, move your opponent. He was hitting relatively lower percentage shots to achieve it but he was doing it safely.

It became clear to me that my forehand was too passive and that I needed to attack more by hitting my forehand up the line instead of always floating it crosscourt. There were instances were I had time and didn’t hit to his backhand to open up the court.

More than anything I felt a bit passive and defensive minded. It is almost like I am playing a basic level when my strokes actually are much more advanced. I can hit the ball in more precise areas and move opponents around. I just choose not to do it.

Of course, on hard courts I have a better feel and my down the line shots are often rewarded with winners if hit well. On clay, I need to think through what I will do after the first down the line shot.

I rehashed the match in my head and came up with the following ideas based on your book.

1) Defensive shots. Get the ball back deep and high either up the middle or crosscourt. If the opponent comes to the net, then hit it at his feet or try to pass him.

2) Neutral rally shots. Do something to hurt him. Move him, hit to the weakness, mix up the pace, something to break up his rhythm and make him move or create an opening.

3) Aggressive shots. Hurt him! Make him run even more, pass you, or return your drop shot. He may win the point but he is going to have to come up with something special to win it.

On clay, there are many more shots which are between 2 and 3. It takes a lot to get a person out of position and defense is much easier. My sense is that I might have been to conservative on my neutral rally shots and that I never really sought out ways to dictate play.

So basically it means that I should seek to hit the ball down the line when I have time and can hit a safe aggressive shot. I am not sure about percentage but I would say that something 30% of my shots should go down the line. Whenever I am close to the baseline and down the line is open I should go for it.

Any thoughts?

What happens when one dictates and one reacts is that the one who reacts plays VERY predictable. I used to play an aggressive dictating game and was RARELY surprised by the reply of my opponent.

So I could anticipate the ball and put my opponent under pressure. In the long term this type of play wins.

And if you are on defense, then you are most of the time slightly late and cannot hit the ball with power and accuracy – so the opponent can keep attacking.

The key in clay court tennis is to find that slightly poorer attacking shot from your opponent and hit a very good neutralizing shot and get equal or even counter attack and take over the initiative.

The tricky thing is that when you are on defense for a couple of shots you get into “defensive mode” and don’t even think about counter attacking. You just think about defending well. So your mind is not really looking for an opportunity to attack and that’s why you don’t see it.

So even though your are on defense you need to be very alert to see whether the next ball is not hit that well from your opponent and you can hit a neutralizing or an attacking shot. Whether that’s down the line or cross court or short cross court or drop shot or slice doesn’t really matter right now.

The down the line shots are dangerous because you are far from a recovery position. So you need to keep that in mind.

If you want to be aggressive in half-defense position then you’ll probably risk a little bit less if you go for a sharp cross court shot than the down the line. This of course depends on your preference whether you hit better down the line or cross court shots.

All three of your points are of course good ones but I believe that’s it was this changing from defense to neutral or even offense that was not executed well and caused your loss.

Related posts:


• My Thoughts On The Henin Bartoli Semifinal Match In Wimbledon
• 4 Tennis Tactics Murray Used To Outplay Nadal
• How To Avoid Playing Short Balls Under Pressure
• How Clay Court Tennis Helped My Game On Hard Courts
• The Balancing Act – Playing Smart Tennis On Clay Courts

This entry was posted on Friday, August 15th, 2008 at 12:44 pm and is filed under Tennis Strategy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.