Playing Spin

Hello sir,

i practice a lot of table tennis in my school.I live in india.Sir here we have no coaches.Can you tell me how can we spin the ball and how can we play spin because everytime i try playing a spinning serve the ball reaches in the other part of the room.But i want to know how can i avoid getting my hand in between while playing?everytime i try to pick a spinning serve my hand comes in between.

please reply i am very serious about Table Tennis

Thank You

Hi Akshay,

It is great to see that you are serious about your table tennis.

Spin is an interesting area and one that will give you a lot of enjoyment, but it will be frustrating at first, so don't worry.

This in an extract of what I said to Niel in a previous question.

"There are a couple of basic principles to remember when trying to get spin on your serves. The first is to be able to generate spin by getting a fine contact on the ball. It may help if you think about it as trying to get a big wheel to turn around by brushing it. You can brush it at the bottom to generate backspin or at th etop to generate topspin. To start with when trying to improve your serve you should probably try the backspin serve.

First start away from the table and just try to get the ball to come back to you with the backspin. Then get on the table and see if you can make the ball spin back on the table without necesarily doing a correct serve. Then you can progress to attempting to serve.

Try these principles out. If you can get the DVD because it will help you with the visuals as well."

I think this will work for you. Remember to persevere though because it will take a lot of time to master.

We have a DVD specifically on serving called 'Serving Secrets Revealed' available in our Online Store. Perhaps you can ask the school to purchase it for you or purchase it your rself. It will really help you to master spin serves.

To work on Returning serves follow these principles that I answered to Maran recently.

The main thing when returning is not to try to do too much. Just use the bat like a rudder to steer the ball back on the table.

If you start with your bat facing directly towards the server and see where the ball goes when you hit it. Then adjust the face of the bat to angle the ball back to the table. So if the ball is going off to your right you need to face the bat to the left. How much you do this will depend on how far the ball went to the right.

It is all about working out the angles. Do not try to spin the ball back initially. You need to learn the effect before you can counteract it properly.