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First strike of the ball is what competition is all about: serve and return.
Those with a huge first/second serve and a huge return are the leaders of the game.
Look at the stats for returning, as almost all the top players are the return leaders at break points, points won, etc. with some clay court exceptions. Fed won with his serving as he was in the top three or four, not so much returning, top 20-30 or so. Raonic has the best chance to break into the top group if he concentrates on his return game. Joker does it with his return game, and holds about 80% of the time. Nadal is top four in both categories, due to his backing up his serve off the ground game.
If you want to win matches, practice has to revolve around serving and returning.
The players most likely to break into the top four are those with the best combination. Janowitz and RAonic have to improve their returning!
For those recreational players, it's not fun to hit an hour of serves and play out the point, two or three a minute, when you can hit dtm for 30 shots in the same time. It's only fun when you win more often. Almost no one concentrates on the first strike of the ball enough. Drilling is the fastest way to focus on the areas that will deliver the most return: your return game, your serve game. The stats don't lie for the pros, although it's a different game for most of us, the reason being most can't attack their serves and returns very well.
The key for the recretational player on serve is to keep the ball out of their strike zone: develop a kick/twist high bouncing ball, and a low outside top/slice slider, and a hip/body serve and mix those up.
The key for the recreational returner, is to attack the return to the lines without missing too many of them, and keep it out of the short middle of the court. Easier said than done! It's easier to break the servers rhythm using movement, different looks, positions, up/back/sideways.
Those with a huge first/second serve and a huge return are the leaders of the game.
Look at the stats for returning, as almost all the top players are the return leaders at break points, points won, etc. with some clay court exceptions. Fed won with his serving as he was in the top three or four, not so much returning, top 20-30 or so. Raonic has the best chance to break into the top group if he concentrates on his return game. Joker does it with his return game, and holds about 80% of the time. Nadal is top four in both categories, due to his backing up his serve off the ground game.
If you want to win matches, practice has to revolve around serving and returning.
The players most likely to break into the top four are those with the best combination. Janowitz and RAonic have to improve their returning!
For those recreational players, it's not fun to hit an hour of serves and play out the point, two or three a minute, when you can hit dtm for 30 shots in the same time. It's only fun when you win more often. Almost no one concentrates on the first strike of the ball enough. Drilling is the fastest way to focus on the areas that will deliver the most return: your return game, your serve game. The stats don't lie for the pros, although it's a different game for most of us, the reason being most can't attack their serves and returns very well.
The key for the recretational player on serve is to keep the ball out of their strike zone: develop a kick/twist high bouncing ball, and a low outside top/slice slider, and a hip/body serve and mix those up.
The key for the recreational returner, is to attack the return to the lines without missing too many of them, and keep it out of the short middle of the court. Easier said than done! It's easier to break the servers rhythm using movement, different looks, positions, up/back/sideways.
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