Interactive Forum: June 2009 Robin Soderling High Speed Video

[EricMatuszewski]

Flat is Back! Even on clay!

What do you do when you're facing an opponent like Rafa Nadal in Paris?

When you look across the net at a man with superhuman speed whom will wear you out with the heaviness of his groundies if you stay in rallies?

Robin Soderling has given us one solution. . .
You flatten it out . . .

Quirky Robin Soderling threw some serious dirt ballers for a loop this year with strokes that feature a lack of loop.

How key do you think Soderling's flat hitting style was to his success this year in Paris?

Robin Soderling: High Speed

[EricMatuszewski]

Quicktime Versions

[jasonfrausto]

Soderling is so unconventional compared to most pro players on his serve toss (doesn't arc it), but there will always be unconventional players that do well. Not to mention his forehand and backhand, he had an amazing French Open this year.

[jperedo]

forehand is very similar to Andy Murray's, but Soderling has way more trunk rotation during the takeback which is where i'm thinking he gets most of his power.

[jeffreycounts]

forehand is very similar to Andy Murray's, but Soderling has way more trunk rotation during the takeback which is where i'm thinking he gets most of his power.

Agreed. The massive trunk rotation was the first thing I noticed as well. He contact point is quite far in front as well.

[airforce1]

Flat is Back! Even on clay!

What do you do when you're facing an opponent like Rafa Nadal in Paris?

When you look across the net at a man with superhuman speed whom will wear you out with the heaviness of his groundies if you stay in rallies?

Robin Soderling has given us one solution. . .
You flatten it out . . .

Quirky Robin Soderling threw some serious dirt ballers for a loop this year with strokes that feature a lack of loop.

How key do you think Soderling's flat hitting style was to his success this year in Paris?

Wouldn't really say the flat hitting style was a big key. If looking for one key, would have to suggest "execution". Soderling executed on a very high level on all aspects of his game that day; mental, serving, rally game, and most of all, making Rafa pay for leaving mid court balls. Oddly enough, "execution" is the hard part when playing hard and flat.

I would be in agreement with Rafa when he said he played very short and Soderling did well with those opportunities.
Yes, Soderling helped Rafa play short, but Rafa often plays short and gets away with it. Did the flat ball play a big part in forcing Rafa to hit short? I do think it played a serious role along with the superior court position he used, because hitting heavy TS off a hard hit, flat ball is extremely tough. But in the end, I see many matches with Rafa leaving lots of short balls that don't get punished, so we can't give too much credit to Soderling in the way of earning the short balls, but we can give him all the credit for making him pay dearly when it happened.

[oliensis]

I had a very cool experience Monday night. I bring it up here because it relates at least significantly to Soderling's beating Nadal (not in terms of LEVEL, no way, but in terms of thought process).

Played a league match against a guy that I lost to last year. He hits loads of topspin (seems to be emulating Nadal's strokes). Last year I got caught flat-footed a lot on balls that were slightly mis-hit, so they landed short but with lots of "pop" off the court. Was on my heels the whole match, not knowing whether I was going to get a short ball or a penetrating topsping drive to hit. And I wasn't able to adjust to it in that first match.

Embarrassingly enough, I actually ruminated on this match intermittently over the intervening time. (Hey, it's just a league match!) I hadn't played anyone else who posed the same problem since. I more or less theorized that I would have to a) be on my toes and recognize the mis-hits sooner, so I could take the short balls early, on the rise, mid-court, and punish him for this, b)serve more aggressively and w/ better variety, to put him on the defensive early in the points (even though playing on har-tru), c)hit service returns deep and high to prevent his getting mid-court balls early in points on his serve, d) open the court to his forehand in order to expose his weaker backhand (he hit aggressive inside-out and inside-in forehands when given the chance, better from that half of the court than when returning a crosscourt forehand).

During warmups I didn't feel particularly good, wasn't moving great, and I felt like I was going to get caught in the same traps I did last year. But I did manage to keep track of the elements of my game plan.

I won the toss and elected to receive because I wasn't "feeling" it during warmpus. I lost his 1st service game on 4 unforced errors by me. Held my serve, which boosted my confidence, and then won the first set by 2 breaks, 6-3.

Went up a break early in the 2nd set, thought, "Hey, I'm going to win this one!", my level dropped and was broken back (stupid brain!), then broke again, and closed out the 2nd set 6-4.

The early recognition of the short ball hit w/ a full swing (his slight mis-hits that had lots of spin and landed short) was the key to putting him on the defensive throughout the match. Could have beat him 6-2 in the 2nd if I hadn't briefly choked when up a break.

Watching Soderling beat Nadal was helpful in terms of modeling a strategy against those loopy, heavy balls that land short and spring up at you. Taking them on the rise is much more productive than sitting back and waiting on them to skip toward me. But the key was early recognition and aggressive movement...getting there in time was 2/3 of the battle.

Thanks Mr. Soderling!

[airforce1]

Pretty cool that Soderlings play inspired you to work harder at attacking those mid ct opportunities. This also would appear to be more evidence for the importance of winning the battle of mid ct attack conversions. Sounds like you were pretty successful at converting your chances, at least enough to force some errors.

[oliensis]

Yup. Thanks.
Missed a few mid-court balls early, but the calmer I stayed on those as the match wore on, the better. More and more I was able to hit solid approaches on the short balls, and then finish/convert the points at net, rather than going for the inner on the short ball. But, punishing him for his short balls was the key...and later in the match he started pressing to keep the ball deep, which forced him into some errors as well.
Best,
ao

Pretty cool that Soderlings play inspired you to work harder at attacking those mid ct opportunities. This also would appear to be more evidence for the importance of winning the battle of mid ct attack conversions. Sounds like you were pretty successful at converting your chances, at least enough to force some errors.

[johnyandell]

When the Swedes landed the long boats to invade England, Soderling would be the type of guy you want first off the boat swinging a big axe.

He absolutely rips the ball and although we don't have actual spin data you don't have to be a genius to see he hits the ball relatively flat.

Funny thing is when you look at the technique he does many things considered less than optimal. We'll be able to say more along those lines in July when we put him up in the Stroke Archives and have more than just a few shots.

On his serve, he has limited body turn. He's about the only pro I've seen who comes straight down with the tossing arm instead of pointing at least partially across his body. Knee bend is strong though! Obviously a super high toss. He's got the great pro racket drop. And his contact point is to the right, further than Federer, or even Andy Murray. That goes with the idea of the flat bomb. Like Roddick he drops his head before contact.

The forehand is also interesting. In the clips we have the turn is good but not as strong as the top players like Fed or Nadal. His backswing is relatively straight and goes back somewhat behind the body, more like some of the top women pros. In the high speed clips his extension seems relatively limited at least on the shots from the front view.

His two-hander is definitely bent/straight. His top hand is turned somewhat toward the top of the frame, more toward the continental. The turn looks great and again it seems really flat. In fact, strangely the face is slightly open in the followthrough. Then he combines this with a huge over the shoulder wrap--in fact over the back, something you'd normally associate with topspin.

[sejsel]

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Watching Soderling beat Nadal was helpful in terms of modeling a strategy against those loopy, heavy balls that land short and spring up at you. Taking them on the rise is much more productive than sitting back and waiting on them to skip toward me. But the key was early recognition and aggressive movement...getting there in time was 2/3 of the battle.

Thanks Mr. Soderling!

Hard to say it any better.
Execution is the key here - (footwork as a requirement for shots to begin with), as someone had mention it earlier.
Personally, I always felt that one of the biggest mistakes anyone could make playing Nadal was playing anything remotely resembling Nadal's own game.

But then again, all of this is easier said than done.

[carrerakent]

airforce1

i have to agree with airforce1's initial response on this thread. i've banged my head for several years now at players being intimidated by Rafa's ball and then they aren't ready to do what Soderling did. Good for Soderling. Several times in clay court matches Federer starts out kicking Rafa's butt to only stop putting on the pressure on the short ball. I don't think we'll see that anymore. I hope.

Soderling seems to be getting his sweetspot behind the ball much earlier than a lot of players. this would greatly increase his ability to hit his targets. silly mcenroe said something about that big long swing like he was amazed that soderling could have success with it. mcenroe was successful in large part with his ground strokes because he also got his sweetspot behind the ball and through the ball with simplicity.

other posters are right on also about the shoulder turn for torque. good way to not shorten the muscles and result in slower racket head speed once the stroke begins.