I was observing a reasonable player practising a few points the other night and made an interesting observation. 90% of their serves were to the bad areas. It occurred to me that a lot of people can really improve their serving by following the simple advice of serving to the good areas. Make sure that you serve the ball either short, so that it bounces twice on the table if left untouched, or very long and fast preferably to the corners. We call these the good areas.
Pick your favourite serve and grab 10 balls. Now try serve all 10 balls and count how many you are able to make bounce twice on your opponents side of the table. The trick here is to still be able to generate lots of spin whilst keeping the ball short. I don't want you to compromise on spin to make the ball short. The key is to have a brushing contact. The brushing contact will mean you can still swing the bat fast but the momentum will go into generating spin and not towards making the ball travel fast.
Here's a table to show you how well you did.
| Score | Comment |
|---|---|
| 0 | Don't bother practising anything else until you can improve upon this score. |
| 1 - 3 | You need some serious practice. Repeat this test every time you play. |
| 4 - 5 | More practice is required but you're on the way. |
| 6 - 8 | Pretty good result, you're control is developing nicely but keep practising. |
| 9 | Impressive! Try and work on varying the spin and speed of your serve while keeping this control. |
| 10 | You've got this completely under control. The next thing is to develop subtle variations of spin to confuse your opponent. |
Yes this really does matter! I realised that part of the problem is your opponent. If you are playing an average opponent, they might not be able to take full advantage of your serves to the bad zone. If you are able to generate some good variation of spin, the serves might still seem effective. But as soon as you step up a level and face an opponent who can attack all of these serves to the bad zone, you are going to seriously struggle. This is why it is important to start serving to the good areas right from the start. And even if your opponent doesn't take advantage of a serve to the bad zones, they will struggle even more with a serve to the good areas.
The great thing about serving to the good areas is it will improve your results against all opponents immediately. Your opponent simply cannot play a full length stroke against a short ball. Also, by serving short your opponent will need to step in to receive the ball and if their footwork is not great you already have them slightly out of position for your next stroke. It also makes your long serves much more effective because your opponent must also get ready for the short ball.
Next time you play, make it a focus to serve the ball short around 80% of the time. Make sure you make your opponent move in to receive these short serves. Try it out and let me know how it goes. It sounds like a small change but it will make a big difference.
Posted 9 years ago
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Michael Coppola Posted 9 years ago
Thanks for the good advice. I was just wondering why the "elbow" area was not included in the good areas. It is often recommend. The long serve to this zone, with some speed often "handcuffs" the opponent. The long fast to the corners seems to work against the opponents that can not move, but not the ones that have the good leg work. The deep serve to the elbows and midsection seem to be more effective on all players. I find it eventually forces the opponent to move back, which then sets him up for a shore serve. Your thoughts.
Thanks
Mike
Alois Rosario from PingSkills Posted 9 years ago
Good points Michael. I think the elbow area is a good area to serve to as long as it is fast to not allow your opponent time to move and play a strong ball.
Richard Fan Posted 9 years ago
Hi Alois,
Great advise as always! Thanks!
Although could you further elaborate the potential trade-offs/disadvantages of short serves? When facing equally skilled or advanced opponents who are able to push aggressively with wide angles or even flick on command? That said, is serving short to the opponents backhand a no-no?
And lastly, is a half-long serve superior than a "short" short serve, tactically?
Thanks!
My regular training partner didn't show up again today. So I spent a good deal of time practicing serves. Then someone came that I know from other times there. So we played a little. Short serves seem to be what I do best now. Having some trouble with long serves, but, a few weeks ago playing with my regular training partner I served so many short serves that when a long one came to him he really didn't know what to do with it.
eugene lu Posted 9 years ago
These are some very very impressive tips. I will take this test and hopefully my service will improve immediately and can be able to win more points with my serves
Dieter Verhofstadt Posted 9 years ago
I'm doing a fair amount of serve training but I find it difficult for especially the short backspin serve to bring it effectively to my games. Somehow it always ends up a little too high with not too much spin and a bit too long as well.
I'll try your metric though.
Patrik Schmuki Posted 9 years ago
But somehow I think if the opponent is really good, with a short serve, he gets a much larger variety of angles to place his response. In contrast to a fast serve to the corners?
John Legg Posted 8 years ago
Hi Alois, I'm useless at table tennis but I'm good at English. Please fix your constant use of 'practicing'. Sure we all need practice. But when we are practising something it has an 's'. Check it out.
Sorry to be boring.
John
Jeff Plumb from PingSkills Posted 8 years ago
Hey John,
Sorry about that, clearly I need to improve my English. I've updated the spelling.
Dean Fitzgerald Posted 8 years ago
John Legg, i never knew about that differance in spelling, Practice vrs Practising. This Ping Skills never ceases to amaze me with what you can take away from it. The question and answer section could be renamed Life Skills.. You never know what members are going to throw on the table, i love it. Dean
kathy mckelvey Posted 8 years ago
Amazing ! thank's Jeff and Alois for sharing these skills, although it is overwhelming for me trying to remember everything. However, you have given me more confidence and challenge to try to be better!! Since I was becoming discouraged trying to advance with the stronger players so that I can compete against them. I set my limit until the end of the year since my club is so competitive.
Ben Ho Posted 8 years ago
The service I mostly use is a short, low over the net service with massive backspin. Especially in doubles this keeps the opponent(s) from getting the initiative immediately.
F Wilson Posted 8 years ago
Your advice is something I look forward too every time it arrives in my in box. My biggest problem with my serve is failure to put it in play. Seems that in the heat of the battle I lose focus and serve into the net WAY too often. Free points to my opponent is a killer. Thank you again for your videos.
Rob S Posted 8 years ago
Hi,
I have been learning to serve a forehand backspin serve short as you suggested. My serves at the moment are pretty erratic, with a good percentage having good backspin (they backup the table towards me), but failing to go over the net. When the ball does go over the net it usually bounces at least twice, and quite often does not reach the end of the table or backs up towards the net. On a couple of occasions I have had the ball bounce back over the net!
I have a couple of questions:
James Finch Posted 8 years ago
Table tennus master at table tennis university recently had a post about three reasons not to serve short.. do you want to look at that
Gurjot Dhaliwal Posted 8 years ago
does timo boll have bad footwork
Mike Viam Posted 8 years ago
John Legg commented...
on the 25-May-2016 06:41:39 PM
Hi Alois, I'm useless at table tennis but I'm good at English. Please fix your constant use of 'practicing'. Sure we all need practice. But when we are practising something it has an 's'. Check it out.
... as a matter of fact, the main difference is on where are you from...!!?
I struggle at TT with a little or no progress as well, but it is much easier for me bettering myself in English... so;
"Care should be taken with the use of the words practice and practise as there are differences in British and US usage. Practice is the correct spelling for the noun in both British and US English and it is also the spelling of the verb in US English. However, in British English the verb should be spelled practise. "(Oxford Dictionary)...
...but that is a whole different matter. Let us focus on table tennis...
Otfried Krumpholz Posted 8 years ago
Hi,
I recently saw the Pingskill video with the statistic about how often average and how often top players serve to the "good" zones (top players: 80 % short, 20 % long, 0 % in the "bad" third quarter of the opponent's side) and started to try to improve my serve according to the tip. Since then I got here and there remarks from my better club colleagues that I have a serve that is not so easy to return (although I don't add any side spin or anything) and my trainer, a former senior world champion, told me my serve is very good and does not even want to work at it at that stage. So I must say, an excellent tip and most interesting statistical info that a lot of club players are unaware of.
Thanks for that tip indeed!
Sabah Waris Posted 7 years ago
Dear Alois
Keep on educating the people in such a sweet way. I agree with the criticism also as they will make good suggestions out of your skills. It will definitely helping the learners also in a better and easy way.
I really appreciate your efforts for this loving game and hopes to hear new tips in this regard.
Thanking you
Sabah Waris
sohrab sadeghi bahmani Posted 7 years ago
Hi, dear Alois,
It was full of informative data! Dear coach after each your class I realize and comprehend new and applicable things. Thank you so much.
But I have still some problems with long and fast spiny serves when I want to control and receive them. Please guide me.
With best regards
Mark Gresser Posted 7 years ago
Good tip about serving short. I play with a couple of really aggressive players, and if I hit the serve a bit high or deep, BAM, smashed return. This forces me to develop some good serving habits...;-)
You mention the footwork; have you and Jeff done a video on footwork? I'm quite curious about how good players think about fore and aft movement.
Thanks,
Mark