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Hi Craig. I really liked your articles on patterns and how to counter other players' strategies. I played a guy recently who didn't hit the ball very hard, but was very, very effective. On his backhand side he sliced deep or angle consistently and then hit down the line top spin winners. His slice had a lot of backspin and essentially never bounced above my knees. On the forehand, he looped it to my backhand or hit hard angle.
I unfortunately don't have a very good slice backhand, but I'm working on it. So, to counter his slice backhand I tried to switch the rally to his forehand either by going down the line with my own double handed backhand or moving around the ball to hit inside in. The problem was that the balls were really low so I had to hit up on the ball to get it over the net, which limited my ability to attack him. Then, he countered by either looping his forehand down the line (maintained me on the backhand side) or hitting hard angle (I was out of position). I tried to counter with the inside out forehand, but the slices were too low to get much top spin on. And, if I ran around it too much he either hit a slice drop shot or smacked a down the line winner.
Essentially, I couldn't get a decent look at any balls because I was either picking his slice out of the dirt or unable to attack his looping forehands. From a comparative standpoint, I can hit the ball twice as hard with equal accuracy, both flat and with top spin on both sides. But, he eventually controlled each point by working his way into the cross court slice.
In retrospect, I needed to move into the court more and do some of my own down the line, slice drop shots to get him moving into the court. Any other suggestions? How can I attack him or counter him with my own slice?
Thank you.
Sean
I unfortunately don't have a very good slice backhand, but I'm working on it. So, to counter his slice backhand I tried to switch the rally to his forehand either by going down the line with my own double handed backhand or moving around the ball to hit inside in. The problem was that the balls were really low so I had to hit up on the ball to get it over the net, which limited my ability to attack him. Then, he countered by either looping his forehand down the line (maintained me on the backhand side) or hitting hard angle (I was out of position). I tried to counter with the inside out forehand, but the slices were too low to get much top spin on. And, if I ran around it too much he either hit a slice drop shot or smacked a down the line winner.
Essentially, I couldn't get a decent look at any balls because I was either picking his slice out of the dirt or unable to attack his looping forehands. From a comparative standpoint, I can hit the ball twice as hard with equal accuracy, both flat and with top spin on both sides. But, he eventually controlled each point by working his way into the cross court slice.
In retrospect, I needed to move into the court more and do some of my own down the line, slice drop shots to get him moving into the court. Any other suggestions? How can I attack him or counter him with my own slice?
Thank you.
Sean