From Pushing a Serve to Attacking a Serve

Is it a fast and long side-spin serve or short spinny side-spin serve ?

Crowsfeather wrote: Is it a fast and long side-spin serve or short spinny side-spin serve ?

NextLevel wrote: If you know how to block a serve, especially a sidespin serve, does that give you insight into how to attack it by following a few logical steps? I want to stop returning serves passively as I find it hard to keep my returns short (offensive returns that are long are okay for me).  It's getting better with experience, but I am looking for anything to accelerate the learning curve.

The return you need is the soft flip:-
BH or FH for all serves that cant be looped
With racket face near vertical stroke gently through the ball, guiding it DEEP to the awkward spot for the opponent. Last minute change of direction enabled by soft wrist, or wiping with sidespin sometimes are good.
Practice identifying the serves that are chopped heavy and open racket to either to drop it short or 'spoon' it over with gentle side top. Also identify too high serves, and close racket to make flat flip kill.
When the short serve has obvious top/side near vertical means slightly closed.
The key to this kind of shot is to make sure the racket path is PURELY HORIZONTAL through the contact phase. If you tend towards downwards you will make errors against backspin, tending towards upward and you will overhit top.
Dont try for speed, rely on placement to fulfill your aggressive intent.
Hitting through the spin will eventually become 2nd nature.
This is the basic attacking return, banana, or chiquita is a more technical alternative. I recommend master hitting through spin first
Hitting gently doesnt sound aggressive, but remember it gives YOU time and if your last second fake is good your opponent will be under pressure dont worry.
By just doing a basically flat (apart from any side)shot you will:-
1. gain confidence by knowing the speed of your racket on these shots
2. by not going for super fast and varied fast topspin flicks you will no longer be confusing yourself with too many errors. Once you know you are limiting yourself to hitting through the spin you find the feedback from errors and success start to make sense.
3. All you really have to be aware of is detecting the chop, top,no spin, factor in opponents serve. After a few months you will find the last second open/close of the racket will be unconscious

Edited by pingpongpaddy - 03/03/2014 at 7:17am

Imo the main principle is that the closer you can get to either pole of the spin axis the lower the effect of the spin due to shorter radius and lower angular velocity.  

Try not looping the ball "forward", but move your racket sideways, in a direction of incoming sidespin:

if an opponent uses pendulum serve then you should move the racket from (your) right to left (hence you need "banana" flick (with racket pointing downwards) here if you receive with your backhand; if this pendulum ball comes to your forehand side you can comfortably FH loop it with this right to left movement if its long - for a short one you need fast footwork and receiving it with BH banana. 

for reverse pendulum (or classic tomahawk) you need to loop it with movement from left to right - probably the most comfortable option here is just always using your backhand (with racket pointing upwards).

I think that generally you have to do a sidespin loop in order to attack a sidespin serve - and you should also open or close the racket angle accordingly depending if a serve is top-side spin or back-side spin. 

NextLevel wrote: If you know how to block a serve, especially a sidespin serve, does that give you insight into how to attack it by following a few logical steps? ... There should be a principle for manipulating the spin that one can start off with. I mean, you don't get to 1800 while being unable to return some serves

Nope, not necessarily. Watch this.

The issue is that attack and defense often require different timings and there is a certain range of optimal impact points and footwork for every stroke depending on the incoming ball. Once you have the strokes grooved down, the next question is are you capable of taking any specific shot at those timings and proficient at executing it in random order?

This is a wealth of tips here. Thanks for all the folks with input.

pingpongpaddy wrote: NextLevel wrote: If you know how to block a serve, especially a sidespin serve, does that give you insight into how to attack it by following a few logical steps? I want to stop returning serves passively as I find it hard to keep my returns short (offensive returns that are long are okay for me).  It's getting better with experience, but I am looking for anything to accelerate the learning curve. The return you need is the soft flip:- BH or FH for all serves that cant be looped With racket face near vertical stroke gently through the ball, guiding it DEEP to the awkward spot for the opponent. Last minute change of direction enabled by soft wrist, or wiping with sidespin sometimes are good. Practice identifying the serves that are chopped heavy and open racket to either to drop it short or 'spoon' it over with gentle side top. Also identify too high serves, and close racket to make flat flip kill. When the short serve has obvious top/side near vertical means slightly closed. The key to this kind of shot is to make sure the racket path is PURELY HORIZONTAL through the contact phase. If you tend towards downwards you will make errors against backspin, tending towards upward and you will overhit top. Dont try for speed, rely on placement to fulfill your aggressive intent. Hitting through the spin will eventually become 2nd nature. This is the basic attacking return, banana, or chiquita is a more technical alternative. I recommend master hitting through spin first Hitting gently doesnt sound aggressive, but remember it gives YOU time and if your last second fake is good your opponent will be under pressure dont worry. By just doing a basically flat (apart from any side)shot you will:- 1. gain confidence by knowing the speed of your racket on these shots 2. by not going for super fast and varied fast topspin flicks you will no longer be confusing yourself with too many errors. Once you know you are limiting yourself to hitting through the spin you find the feedback from errors and success start to make sense. 3. All you really have to be aware of is detecting the chop, top,no spin, factor in opponents serve. After a few months you will find the last second open/close of the racket will be unconscious

Thanks for this - will give it extensive practice and share the results in a month or two.

V-Griper wrote: Imo the main principle is that the closer you can get to either pole of the spin axis the lower the effect of the spin due to shorter radius and lower angular velocity.   So basically the more you can brush over or under the ball the easier it is to override the existing spin and apply your own. Best time would probably be late rise so  that the ball is coming up while you "cover" over the ball with the brushing motion. If you wait for the ball to fall then contact will be made more near the equator and you will have to do more compensation for the spin.  I think this is the operating principle behind the flip and is one of the reasons that it's becoming the standard way to return short and half long serves.

Just the tip, when come to flicking or wrist shot for service return (using forehand) I move my index finger to the center of the bat (pointing to the head) it grants a lot of control and speed.

Crowsfeather wrote: Just the tip, when come to flicking or wrist shot for service return (using forehand) I move my index finger to the center of the bat (pointing to the head) it grants a lot of control and speed.

I heard Timo Boll does that as well, especially on the push. 

NextLevel wrote: Yes, but the serves that bother me are not the ones that come with straight spin where I can read the axis.  The dancing corkscrew serve that breaks at the last second is something that I have always wondered about...   I think I am going to find that Brian Pace DVD and start watching it again.

NextLevel wrote: zeio wrote: NextLevel wrote: If you know how to block a serve, especially a sidespin serve, does that give you insight into how to attack it by following a few logical steps? ... There should be a principle for manipulating the spin that one can start off with. I mean, you don't get to 1800 while being unable to return some serves Nope, not necessarily. Watch this. The issue is that attack and defense often require different timings and there is a certain range of optimal impact points and footwork for every stroke depending on the incoming ball. Once you have the strokes grooved down, the next question is are you capable of taking any specific shot at those timings and proficient at executing it in random order? Thanks for explicating the issue - how do I solve it?

My path of progression went like this. For service receive, I started off with [1st phase]pushes, blocks and counterhits, then backhand punch blocks, forehand flicks and side wipes, then forehand soft and [2nd phase]fast loops, then backhand openers and loopdrives, and now chiquita flicks. The first phase focused on the gradual transition from redirecting to generating pace, then from driving to grazing. The second phase involved drilling at various stages of the bounce and the relevant footwork to achieve that. That about sums up my approach. Your mileage may vary.

Edited by zeio - 03/05/2014 at 2:25am

NextLevel wrote: If you know how to block a serve, especially a sidespin serve, does that give you insight into how to attack it by following a few logical steps? I want to stop returning serves passively as I find it hard to keep my returns short (offensive returns that are long are okay for me).  It's getting better with experience, but I am looking for anything to accelerate the learning curve.

depends if serve going to backhand or forehand side? 

NextLevel wrote: If you know how to block a serve, especially a sidespin serve, does that give you insight into how to attack it by following a few logical steps? I want to stop returning serves passively as I find it hard to keep my returns short (offensive returns that are long are okay for me).  It's getting better with experience, but I am looking for anything to accelerate the learning curve.

nl

the most dramatic improvement you can make is to re-define what is attackable.  i see a lot of guys pushing a serve because they say that the serve was too short to attack...when they could have pasted the return for an outright winner.   these people are still unfamiliar with their own depth of field.

i always do drills with guys at my clubs where whoever has the ball serves as short as possible and the returner *can not* push...no matter how short and spinny the serve is...he *has* to attack..  this creates an attacking mindset and pushes aside (pun intended) the tendency to push...and thus a whole new world opens up since the attack has begun on count two..instead of 3.

regards
rick