Contents

Shot consistency ..................................................................................................................................... 3

Part I .................................................................................................................................................... 3
Part II ................................................................................................................................................... 4
Part III .................................................................................................................................................. 5
............................................................................................................................................................ 5
Summary ............................................................................................................................................. 6
Angle of play ........................................................................................................................................... 7
Angle of play ....................................................................................................................................... 7
Mirror concept .................................................................................................................................... 8
Summary ............................................................................................................................................. 9
Effective patterns for the first three ball contacts as server .................................................................. 9
Summary ........................................................................................................................................... 11
The five phases model state of play................................................................................................... 12
Introduction ...................................................................................................................................... 12
The technical five phase model ........................................................................................................ 13
The tactical five phase model ........................................................................................................... 13
A general outline to apply time pressure on the opponent ............................................................. 14
Balancing the risk for the first seven balls ........................................................................................ 15
Summary ........................................................................................................................................... 15
Legal serve hiding.................................................................................................................................. 16
Introduction ...................................................................................................................................... 16
Acoustical information ...................................................................................................................... 16
Optical information ........................................................................................................................... 17
Side note: The poker approach ......................................................................................................... 20
Summary ........................................................................................................................................... 20
Push to the backhand! .......................................................................................................................... 21
0. Introduction .................................................................................................................................. 21
1. Advantages.................................................................................................................................... 21
2. Disadvantages ............................................................................................................................... 21
3. Advanced analysis ......................................................................................................................... 21
4. Back to Waldner ............................................................................................................................ 23
5. Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 24
Strategical and tactical depth ............................................................................................................... 25
1. Strategy and tactic ........................................................................................................................ 25

1
 2. Yomi layers .................................................................................................................................... 25
3. The cross over point ( COP ) .......................................................................................................... 29
4. Experimenting ............................................................................................................................... 30
5. Summary ....................................................................................................................................... 32

20 100% ................................................................ 33

2
Shot consistency
In this post were making some basic observations on what makes a shot
consistent. We wont consider the technical level of a player but focus on the table
geometry and try to derive some statements. Please keep in mind, that by
consistency we are referring to the probability of a ball to land on the other side of
the table based on several factors. But dont worry its not rocket science. After
reading this article you should be able to answer the following questions:

Which factors determine the consistency?

Which statements can be derived from that?

Do you need any prior knowledge from an other blog article to understand this? No.

Lets start with the factors that determine the consistency:

trajectory of the ball over the table half (Part I)

the point we want to hit (Part II)
ratio of speed to spin of the ball (Part III)

Part I

Here we see some trajectories of table tennis balls. Straight lines suggest
plain topspin balls (1,2,4) while 3 represents a ball with side spin. Based on this view
we could say, that the longer the trajectory observed from above the higher the
probability that our shot will hit since we have more table to hit. We will see later
why this isnt true for all type of strokes. But for the moment we conclude that a
longer line is equal to a higher safety. The longest straight line can be achieved by
and trajectory from one net edge to the opposite table edge. However, there are
curved lines like 3 which provide a greater length and therefore more security.

3
Part II

Lets focus on the topspin trajectories for

an easier understanding. If we look at the
straight yellow line in picture one then we will
see that the point P which has equal space on
both sides maximizes our security approach. The
equal spaces P are needed because every
player has a certain accuracy for his shots. If he
want to hit Spot P he has certain probabilities to
lie within certain limits (Picture 1).

But since we cant play that close to the net we

have to adjust the midpoint to P in accordingly.
As we can see, our space to hit gets smaller to a
distance P (Picture 2).

Additional problems arise simply due to the fact

the we want to hit near the white end line most
times which cuts some of our secure space
out(red). Furthermore, since we have a high
probability to lie within a special boundary, we
dont really have the whole yellow line, but only
pieces close to the point we want to hit(green).

The concept of this circular disk is shown in

picture four. Lets say the disk stand for a
probability of 90% the a player plays within the
colored disk if he aims for the midpoint. By
looking at points at picture four we indeed see
that with our disk model its completely irrelevant
if we choose a point on the long line from edge
to edge or the short side line.

In the following part we want to add the aspect

of the spin to speed ratio of the ball to our
model.

4
Part III

Lets exploit the idea of circular

probability disks a little more. The radius
of the disk is determined by the
technical ability of a player. Professional
players are said to have diameters of
two table tennis balls if the shot isnt
made under stress which is equal to a
radius of one table tennis ball. For an
amateur under stress this radius can be
quite large. At this point we have to pay
attention to the speed spin ratio. Its
sufficient to understand that our circular
disk is just a model, which changes ist
geometric form based on the speed and
spin parameters and the ball trajectory
seen from above. The speed to spin
ratio is simplified in the following
argumentation steps to three possible
states:

speed < spin (1)

speed = spin (2)
speed > spin (3)

We see (Picture 1) how this ratio

influences the shape of our disk. If the
speed of the ball is equal to the spin we
get our usual disk, however if the spin is
greater the disk is stretched along the
trajectory. We note that the area of the
disk and the stretched disk are equal. If
they arent in the images its caused by
poor illustration skills and not
intentional. If the spin is greater than
the speed, the disk is stretched
perpendicular to the trajectory.

Picture two shows us that for a trajectory perpendicular to the end line we lose half
of our safe space. Quality wise (1) is the best, followed by (2), then (1). This results

5
from the usual definition of quality regarding the end line, the nearer the end line
the better. Since (1) has the most points close to the end line its of the best quality.

If we consider straight shots to the table corner (Picture 3), we see that a shot with
more speed then spin (3) saves most of our secure space and should be the desired
option for straight shot to the edge, which we achieve by an usual topspin stroke
from our forehand side.

To finish our forehand topspin stroke study, we consider the following two cases:

Trajectory 1 is loaded with a strong side spin and we want to hit a point on the side
line. Curve 2 contains less side spin and aims for a point on the end line. Using our
knowledge we just made above we use more spin than speed for arc 1 which results
in a disk perpendicular to the trajectory at the point we want to hit. The remaining
curve uses a speed over spin approach to retain a high part of the disk, where the
disk is stretched along the path. Both cases are shown on the right.

Following and modifying the above steps we can make clear statements for every
possible trajectory and points to hit, but this is beyond the scope of this blog post.

Summary
Factors that determine the consistency:

trajectory of the ball over the table

the point we want to hit
ratio of speed to spin of the ball

How to use it ( for forehand strokes, rest up to the reader ) :

1. straight shots to the forehand corner with more speed than spin
2. straight shots to the backhand corner with more spin than speed
3. curved shots to the side line with more spin that speed

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 4. slightly curved balls to the end line with more speed than spin

Angle of play
Have you ever wondered why your enemy always seems to stand closer and better
to the ball? Or why he can push you around like you have never played table tennis
before? Well, this might be because he follows and uses several principles around
the angle of play approach.

After reading this article you should be able to answer the following questions:

What is the angle of play?

Which other ideas can be derived from it?
How can I make use of it?

Do you need any prior knowledge from an other blog article to understand this? No.

Angle of play
Due to technical and anatomical restrictions every player at the moment he contacts
the ball(black dot below) has a well defined area he is able to hit on our half. This
area is a cone starting from the point where he hits the ball and the two sides or
fixed points behind the net. Below we can see some examples with the cone in
green.

If we study the pictures a bit more we notice, that we should use the left or right
side of the table if we play short. This minimizes the angle of play compared to a
short placement to the middle.

Surprisingly this changes for long placements. If we want to get the smallest angle
here, we have to play to the middle and avoid the corners. We can spot this quite
frequently in professional games if both players are not to far away from the table
and both want to cut the angle of play down. They will continuously play the middle
in this situation. Another common game situation for observing this can be found if
one player has a slight disadvantage in a rally or if he is a lobber. He will always aim
for the middle to minimize the distance he has to cover far away from the table.

7
 On a side note, we see that the angle of play
cone also explains why our required footwork
rises the later we hit the ball. The area we have
to cover continuously rises (1 to 4) the further
we move back. This means our uncertainty
about the placement of the next ball gets
bigger.

Mirror concept
We now understood the angle of play concept.
However, where should we stand knowing our
green response cone?

Another concept will help us out here, the so

called mirror concept. Lets consider the
example below. We are standing and hitting the ball at the beginning of the yellow
arrow and aiming to the point where he ends. The mirror principle now tells us to
move to the location we get, if we connect the point where we hit the enemy table
half and connect it with the middle of the whole table at the net(grey point).
Remember that we know beforehand where our ball will land and we therefore have
some extra time using all the principles described in this post.

Why does this advice actually work? If you look again at the picture we just spoke
about you see a straight yellow line. This line is the angle bisector of the green cone.
If we want to minimize the footwork to cover the cone to both sides we have to
stand there. Although the grey line from the mirror concept and the yellow angle
bisector line from the cone are different, it is more then enough information to act
by moving in this way and a good rule of thumb. We also note that the difference
between these two lines is getting smaller the further away to point where our
enemy hits the ball lies.

8
Looking a bit into the grey line and how it is build, we can understand why this
concept is called mirror concept, we mirror the position of the enemy through the
midpoint of the table.

Summary
1. angle of play: cone which determines the area you have to cover
2. mirror principle: connect the probable ball impact location on the enemy side
with the table midpoint to a line and try to reach that location after you hit
the ball (ASAP)
3. mirror principle is a rule of thumb but gets more exact once the ball location
goes away from the net

Effective patterns for the first three ball contacts

as server
Many players develop several patterns over time which are effective for them.
However, few people systematically search for it or know why certain strategies
work, they just subconsciously collect them. In the following post we want to find
the most effective placements for the first three balls as a server using the table
geometry.

After reading this article you should be able to answer the following questions:

What are the most effective strategies?

Why are they effective?

Do you need any prior knowledge from an other blog article to understand this?

No, but we will use results from here.

We exploit the table geometry by using the pure size of it. By doing so, we force the
enemy to cover maximal distances over the table.

The first three balls are the serve by us, the receive by the enemy and our following
ball. The number of ball placements we can influence is therefore two.

We want to simplify the possible placements and lengths to short(s)/long(l) and

forehand(FH)/backhand(BH). For two balls this is equal to 16 possibilities, 4 for each
ball . Since want want the enemy to cover maximal distances most of them fall
off. One combination, lBH,sFH falls off because its technically hardly doable. The
complementary pair, lFH,sBH can be achieved by using a long serve to the FH and a
backhand loop to the wide backhand afterwards. As we saw, the placement short
shall also include the wide side like wide backhand for the backhand etc and vice
versa.

9
The following three combinations remain:

1. short forehand + long backhand

2. short backhand + long forehand
3. long forehand + short backhand

They are displayed below:

The yellow arrow is our serve. The green arrow stands for the safe approach or
variation of the third ball if the enemy get used to our pattern. Remember that the
green arrow should be played with more speed then spin according to our results
from here. The remaining red arrow stands for the high risk high reward third ball
approach and let the enemy react to the greatest table area. We can use our
previously linked results for the short red arrows where we stated that this balls
should be played with more spin than speed. Finally, the long red arrow should be
played with more spin than speed.

A few annotations to the possible returns made by our enemy on the second ball.

If he returns our long serve to the forehand (3) cross court to our forehand side,
then we should play it parallel to his backhand. This way we changed at least the
side between the first and our second ball placement and apply the greatest possible
time pressure on him based on the table geometry. In general, if we want to judge
the quality between several return possibilities, we should always favor the option
which causes the most time or reaction pressure to the opponent. This issue will be
covered in another blog post separately. As soon as its out, well link it here.

Incase the opponent returns our short parallel serve to the forehand (1) short
parallel we should still be able to fulfill the placement recommendation.

10
Option 2 suggested to use a short serve to the backhand. If the enemy responds
with a short or long ball to our forehand we can even improve the suggest
placement by playing to his wider forehand afterwards.

Based on the above pictures we clearly see the importance of a good backhand
game for executing this patterns.

Summary
Best third ball attack pattern regarding the table geometry:

short forehand + long backhand

short backhand + long forehand
long forehand + short backhand

If we cant use the best second placement because the opponent returned
differently than in the pictures above we choose our next placement by looking for
the option which applies the most time pressure to him.

A good backhand game is crucial to apply this patterns.

11
The five phases model state of play
Do you sometimes wonder why you lose games even if you think that you played
good? Well, table tennis is a highly technical, but also tactical game.

Its sometimes even said that table tennis is chess on lightning speed. To be fair,
youll probably hear this statement about many different types of sports.

Nevertheless, table tennis is also a probability game and knowing in which tactical
situation(phase) you are, will definitely improve your probability to win the point if
you act accordingly.

Enough small talk, after reading this article you should be able to answer the
following questions:

What is the five phase model?

Which two main types exist?
How can I make use of it?

Introduction
The five phase model is a tool to illustrate the possible technical and tactical states,
which can occur during a rally.

A phase with a higher number is always better than all phases with a smaller
number. The higher the number, the better our state of play. We therefore want to
improve our state by climbing the ladder up or at least try to avoid to fall down. We
should note, that we can score a point in every phase even if we consider it worse
than the phase in which our enemy currently plays. His phase is symmetric to ours,
by multiplying our state by -1 we get his state and vice versa. We of course
remember the simple multiplication rules. The numbers range from -2 to 2, hence
the name of model.

Transitions between all phases are possible, not just adjacent ones. A jump from
phase -2 to 0 is possible but also causes a high risk (just tactical model). The further
we jump, the more risks we are taking(just tactical model). If we fall the ladder
down by some staves we made an error. The extent of it can be measured by the
number of staves we fell down, the more the bigger our error.

We want to to distinguish between the technical model and the tactical model.

The model can be imagined as a scale. The opponents and our side can be balanced
(0), slightly unbalanced(1,-1) or heavily unbalanced (-2,2) to one side.

12
The technical five phase model

We assign a number to every stroke. A strength with 2, a normal stroke with 1 and a
weakness with 0. Our strokes get a positive sign, the strokes of our enemy a
negative sign, e.g. oponents strength is -2. We then use some some basic calculus
by adding our and the opponents number. The result is the associated phase.

If we want to apply this model, we have to know, what are our strong,normal and
weak strokes. Additionally we have to know, to which of these strokes does our
enemy respond with which strength. If we want to apply the above model we have
to build up this knowledge base on the fly, because our strengths depends on our
form of day and our opponent. Once we have a solid foundation for our model we
can make educated guesses about our usual applied phase and the transitions we
are trying to make. With this tool we are able to make objective observations, be it
in game or during the video analysis.

The tactical five phase model

Before we look at the model itself we have to make some preliminary definitions.

We want to distinguish between forced and unforced errors. An error itself is a point
loss. Unforced errors are made without any time pressure, while a forced error is
purposely forced by playing the cross over point, playing the open side or other
methods.

A tactically advantageous situation is described by several of the following points:

13
 we are closer to the table than our enemy
we are close to the angle bisector line of the angle of play and are close to
the middle line of the table
the time pressure on us during our stroke was smaller than the time pressure
under which the enemy made his stroke

We bring ourself in a tactical advantageous situation if we put our opponent under

time pressure and therefore force an error.

If we stay closer to the table than our opponent he has to cover greater distances
for every angle of play cone.

On the other side, if we stay close to the table and close to the angle bisector of the
angle of play we minimize the probability to come under time pressure.

A general outline to apply time pressure on the opponent

Case 1: Opponent close to the table

we play the cross over point, this leads to a more open side, if the open side
gap isnt large enough, we do it again
we play the open side

Case 2: Opponent away from the table

we play wide forehand or backhand

we play the open side
we try to lock the enemy on the backhand since the power he can apply there
isnt as strong as on the forehand side, once he steps around, we play the
forehand side
we alternate between short and long placements

Finally the table of the tactical model:

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Balancing the risk for the first seven balls

We can improve our efficiency or our ratio between efforts,risks and benefits by
applying the above models for the first seven balls.

Lets start with the case where we are the server.

We assume that the server has an advantage over the receiver. The purpose of our
serve is to provoke a weak return, which we are able to attack or at least increase
the power of the ball. By power we mean the two energies a ball possesses,
translational energy and rotational energy, or simply put, speed and spin. If we want
to increase the power in the third ball, we take risks. We also have a higher
regeneration time because or higher power is usually achieved by a larger stroke
movement.

The next ball we can influence is the fifth ball. It would be a bad idea if we would try
to increase the power again. The opponent had less trouble at the fourth ball since
he probably used a more compact stroke, with less risk and a better regeneration
time. The fifth ball should therefore be used to maintain our current tactical phase
and prepare a seventh ball where we can increase the power again.

An examples for a bad energy management or risk taking behaviour is given below.

We try to directly score the point on the third ball by playing an all in forehand
stroke to the opponents forehand side. The higher the level of our opponent, the
higher the changes that he can return this ball, because he hardly face any time
pressure up to this point. If we made a large stroke movement then our arm is
probably still at the highest point while the returned ball passes our wide forehand.

Now the receivers point of view.

Since the server has an advantage, we want to take this advantage away from him
or at least dont give him the third ball he is looking for. If we can achieve this, were
even. Then we have the possibility to increase the power on the fourth ball.

Summary

Try to use each of the models to balance your risk and evaluate your behaviour
during the game.

The tactical model can be internalized beforehand and should be applied

automatically. However, the technical model has to be build on the fly.

15
Legal serve hiding
Do you ever thought about all the information you transmit to an opponent way
before you hit the ball and after you hit the ball?

If no, please go ahead reading this post and see how many parameters of your
following serve you previously freely gave to the enemy.

If yes, please check if I covered everything and if not, feel free to spot my mistakes
and leave a comment.

After reading this article you should be able to answer the following questions:

What kind of information does a service motion possess?

How can I change and fake this information?

Do you need any prior knowledge from an other blog article to understand this? No.

Introduction
Lets start with the rules given by the ITTF.

After we read and understood the rules, we can go on to the mentioned parameters
of information.

With every played ball we transmit acoustical and optical information to our
opponent. By hiding our serve legally, we want to summarize methods and
behaviour which consciously alter and fake these transmitted signals.

Acoustical information
We unconsciously rely on acoustic information. If we want to experience a proof by
ourselves we can use earplugs which suppress any noise or use our MP3 player with
soft music. After we tried to play like this we should be convinced that acoustic
information is indeed helpful to play table tennis.

The acoustical information for a serve consists mainly of the impact of the ball and
the racket. If we hit the ball more frontal we get a louder noise compared to a
brushing motion.

unfortunately we cant modify this signal, because by modifying it we would have to

change our service itself. However, we can hide the signal stream by mixing it with
another noise, the sound we can make with our left foot during our weight transfer.
We stamp our foot on the ground the moment we make the ball racket contact and
we legally altered the acoustical information.

16
Optical information

The fact that we also rely on optical information can be easily seen if we receive
serves from table tennis robots with unknown parameters. Due to the lack of optical
information we have a hard time producing a good return.

There are several optical parameters, below we see the information which is
transmitted on the left and the parameters which influence it behind it.

1. angle of play : position from where we serve, relative position of our feet to
the table,service type,shoulder line
2. power of the ball(speed and rotation) : type and extend of our backswing
3. type of rotation : angle of our blade and stroke direction
4. amount of rotation : location of the point of impact on our racket
5. type of rotation : position of the elbow
6. length,amount of rotation : throw height

Lets examine the points a little further and start with the first two points.

The position from where we serve can be divided to serving from our backhand side,
the middle and our forehand side. Combined with the service type
(pendulum,reverse pendulum, forehand / backhand execution etc.) we get a clearly
defined angle of play.

The shoulder line shall be the imaginary line from one shoulder to the other one.
This line roughly points in the direction to which the serve will be played. The
relative position of the feet to the table is closely related to the shoulder line, since
we cant wrap our upper body freely but are limited based on the position of our
feet.

Its important to use the left foot during the serve like Ma Long or Zhang Jike. They
place their left foot not parallel to the end line but slighty angled away from it. This
enables us to do a bigger back swing since we lift our left foot once we shifted our
weight to the right foot and chance the angle and position of the left foot to a
angled position in the direction of the end line. Additionally this enables us to hide
our racket angle during the back swing and until we hit the ball.

A short remark on the back swing. A bigger back swing enables us to apply more
power to the ball but also demands a better coordination. The back swing and the
part of the swing up to the ball impact should happen as close to the body along the
shoulder line as possible. This makes it harder for the enemy to focus on our racket
angle and the ball since our body partially covers the blade and is close to the ball.
Please note that we implied in the last point that we throw the ball up close to the
body and hit it there.

These technical subtleties hide some information from the enemy (racket angle) and
condense the information which we cant legally hide, which makes it harder for an
opponent to focus on certain parameters.
17
This behaviour can be spotted on most of the professional male chinese players,
especially Ma Long.

Lets move on to the third point.

Its undoubtably that the racket angle and the direction in which we hit the ball
exactly defines the imparted spin. We cant change this but we can disguise what
happened. In the previous paragraphs we discussed our behaviour until the point of
impact, then we understood in this paragraph that this point cant be changed which
just leaves the follow through open to further studies.

The following options are given regarding our follow through:

stop immediately after the ball impact

continue the service motion as if we want to guide the ball
fake the follow through of another service type (Ma Lin, Ma Long)
completely hide the follow through ( Timo Boll, Jan Ove Waldner, Micheal
Maze)

If we stop the motion after the ball contact we show the enemy the racket angle
with which we hit the ball the whole time which cant be our aim. Guiding the ball
after the contact ensures a good trajectory but doesnt help us hiding the serve.

If we fake the follow through of another spin type we send the enemy contradictory
signals which may cause some delay in his reaction. Faking the follow through is
especially successful if it fakes the opposite type of spin which means topspin for a
backspin ball and clockwise spin for counterclockwise ball and vice versa. This
maximizes the error if the enemy falls for this fake motion. We should note that
professional players hardly fall for this fake movements because they just focus on
the point of impact and they are trained to ignore the follow through. We therefore
cant expect the enemy to fall for it . Nevertheless its the best option compared the
previous two.

Another way to handle the follow through is hiding it. We achieve this by dropping
our racket immediately after the ball impact with an increased speed below the table
level. The closer the height of the impact is to the table height the shorter the
observation time for the enemy.

At this point the question might arise, why the reverse pendulum serve is that
popular even though its hard to impossible to use the last two methods with it. The
simple answer is the fact, that the serve itself makes it incredible hard to judge the
amount of back-, side- or top- spin. Slight differences in the elbow position alone
can cause heavy backspin or strong sidespin. The amount of obfuscation we can
achieve with most serves and the fake follow through is on the same level as the
reverse pendulum serve alone.

The fourth point deals with the location of the impact point on the racket. We want
to take a look at the image below before we start our reflections.

18
The bounciness for the middle ball is high because the sweet spot is located there.
The bounciness of the lower and upper ball is quite low, sometimes this spots are
referred as dead spots in terms of the bounciness. If we want to serve we should
use the lower or upper locations because the middle one lacks control due to its
bounciness.

The blade velocity or to be exact the velocity of a point on that position rises the
further it is away from the handle and reaches its maximum on tip the of the racket.
The difference between the maximal possible spin is roughly 60 percent. Again if we
are the server we should use the lower or upper location. The middle location falls
off because of the high bounciness. The lower spot is used to fake high spin. If the
enemy doesnt see that we used the lower spot and not the common upper one, he
will heavily misjudge the incoming spin and vice versa. As mentioned, the top spot is
the usual point to hit the ball since it imparts the greatest spin due to its high
velocity.

Remember the basic physical principle that if we rotate the racket around the handle
a point near the handle has a shorter orbit than the point near the tip. To keep itself
together the upper point has to finish this longer orbit in the same time the point
below finishes its shorter orbit. This is only possible with a higher velocity and the
reason for smart kids to use the outer circle at the carousel, its clearly faster than
the fire trucks and horses on the inner circles.

Now we want to consider the fifth point, the position of the elbow.

We can convince ourself by tinkering with the pendulum serve that the height of the
elbow determines the amount of sidespin on the ball. The higher the elbow, the
higher the amount of imparted sidespin.

Be aware that many players use this common knowledge to fake strong side on the
backhand by using a high elbow but locking their wrist parallel to the table to

19
achieve backspin. Ovtcharov uses this trick very often and with great success on his
backhand serves.

Last but not least the height of the throw. A higher throw results in a higher speed
during the impact and can be used to achieve higher speed and spin values for the
serve. The drawback of a high throw is that it demands a higher coordination. A high
throw is useful versus amateur players because they usually follow the ball with their
eyes during the whole flight and not just at the impact like the professional players
do. After the long flight the impact appears more suddenly and hits them off guard.

Side note: The poker approach

If we want to mess the opponent up, we can build up fake tells during the game just
to break this pattern if we need it. This might be illustrated if we think of a situation
where we hold the racket perpendicular to the ground if we serve side spin before
the backswing starts. This will be our false tell. In a crucial moment we will break
this pattern by holding the racket in the same way but serve backspin.

This example also reminds us to have the same starting posture for all types of spin
of a certain service type. This ensures that we dont build real tells up.

Summary
possible information: acoustical / optical
use your left leg to stamp on the ground and to cover your backswing
backswing close to the body
throw the ball up near to the body and hit it close to it
alter the contact point on the racket between the given lower and upper
points
fake the follow through or hide it
use fake tells and avoid having real ones

20
Push to the backhand!
The simple concept of a push to the backhand is often overlooked or proscribed as
not state-of-the-art or a beginner thing in times of the chiquita receive.

The following lines aim to explain the idea behind a push to the backhand and its
advantages for beginners, intermediate player and semi professionals alike.

These articles are obligatory to read:

Ball geography
Spin evasion
Angle of play

0. Introduction
As an appetizer we look at these balls from Waldner and watch the video again after
we understood the concept explained here.

1. Advantages
everyone can push
the push doesnt need to be short even contrary, we aim to play it long
if the opponent attacks, he bears all the risks by doing so, while we can
benefit from his power and redirect it
if he pushes back, the ball will be long most of the time
most players attack long backspin pushes which makes this applicable most of
the time

2. Disadvantages
Backspin doesnt limit the angle of play, if the opponent pushes back he can
vary the placement to a great extend ( however we play long and to the
backhand to minimize this ).
If the opponent reacts with a weak, slow,high and spinny topspin we need
the appropriate technique to attack these balls, which is often troubling for
amateurs.

3. Advanced analysis
Caution, we are in the position of the push receiver now!

We can use the picture given below to understand and verify the details of the next
considerations. (Click for a large version in a new tab.)
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We distinguish between three shot directions:

to the middle,
to the backhand,
and to the wide backhand.

Additionally we consider three different contact points:

central,
right,
and left.

22
The central contact point is located near the equator and above. With this contact
location we have to overcome the full amount of incoming spin according to the spin
evasion article. We also note how the short grey line symbolizes the axis of rotation.
A positive aspect is the fact that we are able to use the forehand or backhand.

Its possible to overcome the incoming backspin in this way but:

due to technical restrictions we have a small angle of play

because we have to fight the whole spin amount our return wont be too
strong.

The right contact point is located slightly below the equator on the right side:

its a solid way to evade the backspin and make a strong return
we can only use our forehand
our angle of play is limited

The left contact point is located slightly below the equator on the left side:

its a solid way to evade the backspin and make a strong return
we can use backhand and forehand although we need the inside out
technique for the forehand option
our angle of play is limited

The middle placement:

leads to an opponent who stands close to the middle or slighty at the

backhand side
doesnt limit the angle of play as well as the other two options

The backhand placement:

forces the opponent to face to full amount of spin for the backhand loop or
forces a footwork action with consecutive forehand or backhand
limits the angle of play better and forces a even greater footwork action if the
angle of play shall be maximal due to inside out techniques

The wide backhand placement:

shares all the properties of the backhand option but cuts the angle of play
even more
requires even more footwork and leaves the forehand wide open

4. Back to Waldner
Waldners main tactical tool was the push to the backhand or wide backhand as
receive and a consecutive ball to the forehand. In this way he controlled most
opponents and forced them to come into a bad tactical state, see the article on

23
tactical phases. He then proceeded to keep the opponent running until he missed or
Waldner hit a winner.

Professionals are taught and used to looping long backspin balls and want to take
the initiative at this kind of given shot.

With a ball to the backhand or wide backhand, the opponent either has to face the
whole spin and makes a predictable spinny loop to the backhand or has to open a
side by moving to the backhand and hitting from there with an relative small angle
of play. Because of this Waldner was able to anticipate the next ball with a high
certainty.

5. Conclusion

To sum it up, the beauty of this method is:

easy to apply
works most times because the opponent wants to attack
opponent gets into a bad tactical state in most cases (footwork, regeneration
time, position)
opponent bears the risk while we can borrow his power
alternatives hardly available

Now we go back to our Waldner example of the beginning and see the method in
action.

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Strategical and tactical depth
If we consider all possible contact points, stroke directions and techniques available
and add different trajectories, speed to spin ratios and contact points on the
opponents half, we get a sheer infinite amount of possibilities or variations.

Do we need the ability to be an expert in every possible variation?

If not, which variations can be left out and why?

These and many more questions will be answered in the following lines.

1. Strategy and tactic

Both strategy and tactic are used to achieve a certain aim. If we have a given
timeframe to operate on, strategy describes actions to achieve a long term goal
while tactic is used to achieve short term goals.

Examples:

Our long term goal in the given timeframe of our lifetime might be to become
a good table tennis player. To achieve this, we need to learn several
techniques like looping backspin, which will be our tactics.
We want to learn the reverse pendulum serve which will be our long term
goal. To achieve this, we need to practice it alone, versus club members, in
practise matches and in regular matches. Additionally we need the proper
techniques ( backhand over the table loop and forehand looping against
sidespin balls to the middle and far right ) to make a good use of it.

As a side note, long term goals might be delayed in certain situations in favor of
short term goals. Imagine we have the goal to test our newly learned serve. If we
are now playing an important league match where our score affects the seasonal
result heavily, then we should ignore our long term serve goal and substitute it by
winning the game at all costs with our reliable weapons.

Due to the definition, we can say that strategy and tactic are exchangeable words, if
we change the timeframe. For example, improving your service receive might be
your long term goal for two weeks but once we look at it from a bigger timeframe, it
becomes a short term goal on our way to become a good table tennis player.

2. Yomi layers
The word yomi () is the japanese word for reading and the concept of Yomi
layers was brought to my mind by the beautiful article Yomi Layer 3: Knowing the
Mind of the Opponent by SIRLIN. Its explained very well there so please read his
explanation until the Virtua Fighter example. If you have time, his free online book

25
Playing to Win is also worth reading but not necessary for the further reading of this
article.

If we want to adapt this concept to table tennis we have one big problem there
are no distinct techniques and counter techniques in table tennis. An opponent can
always decide if he wants to receive our forehand loop with forehand or backhand,
with counterlooping, blocking, fishing,lobbing,chopping and many more techniques.
In other words, there is not one clear counter move but a set of many counter
moves.

We go back to the original Yomi approach to look for solutions for our problem. One
result of the original idea is, that you only need two alternative moves and not more
if every move has one counter move.

Another result was the fact that because of our two move options the opponent
cant be sure which one we apply and therefore has to wait until he sees what we
are doing or takes a gamble on what we might use.

Back to table tennis. We cant reduce the counter options of the opponent but we
can prepare a set of two moves which cause the most time pressure on the
opponent.

In terms of table tennis this means the following:

1. We decide which shot we want to use, lets say a forehand loop from the
backhand.
2. We need to be able to perform techniques which look similar until the last
second but greatly vary and therefore apply the most time pressure in the
above case. (Yomi interpretation: The opponent isnt sure which move m1 or
m2 we apply until the last second.)
3. We apply our stroke of choice, here the inside out loop to the backhand or
the regular loop to the forehand

To sum it up again, what characteristics should our alternatives m1,m2 share?

The look similar until the last second.

They enable us to use the maximal angle of play to apply time pressure.

Please note, that we always have one alternative which is technically harder to
achieve and in most cases weaker in the amount of power which can be applied.

However, if we arent able to play this alternative we cut our possible angle of play
by 50 percent and become predictable.

A short example how intermediate players get predictable can be seen below. The
player on the bottom side cant play the inside out loop and steps around at his

26
backhand to loop. Because his angle of play is that small, the opponent can easily
predict the incoming placement and exploit the open forehand side with a
countertopspin.

A short and possibly incomplete list of stroke pairs which fulfill the above
listed criteria:

Forehand

loop inside out loop

smash- smash with wrist angled back
pushing a short ball pushing a short ball
hook loop backhand fishing
parallel block sidespin block to the forehand
pushing a short ball flick

Backhand

loop-inside out loop

pushing a short ball pushing a short ball
chiquita reverse chiquita
over the table loop over the table flick ( FZD style which is rather a smash
where you wrap around the ball and generate hardly any topspin )
pushing short balls flick ( Ma Long is somewhat famous for his last second
variation on this shot)

27
At this point we see the shortcomings of a chopper or lobber far away from the
table. Because he is far away from the table, his angle of play is small. Additionally
he doesnt want to play extreme angles but to the middle line to secure himself from
sharp angles. The only thing he can and will change is the amount of top-,side- and
bottom spin.

The ability to exploit the whole angle of play can be best seen at professional
players. Below we see the variations used in several game states.

Service placement variation

Distance between service and third ball

In game variations

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3. The cross over point ( COP )

A common tactic is playing to the cross over point ( COP ). However there are
situations where we shouldnt use this tactic and times where we should apply it.

At first we see the typical problem of playing to the COP, we let the opponent decide
what he wants to play.

Lets assume we play to the COP. The opponent decides if he plays forehand or
backhand. Therefore he is able to exploit the full angle of play with his strong side.
An opponent which cant loop inside out might just use his backhand this way and
even get a higher quality because the backhand loop is technically easier than the
inside out loop of the forehand side.

The second problem, since we enforce an immediate decision, we get an immediate

return.

All in all, it doesnt look good for the COP, we let the opponent use his stronger side,
dont limit his angle of play and even get a fast return.

But there a silver linings.

We can use the COP if the opponent is really close to the table because his
reaction time is very small and he cant apply full power this way. Even better,
if he wants to step around, he usually have to take a step back and we
pushed him a bit away from the table. If we watch backhand to backhand
rallies from Ma Long and Zhang Jike well notice how they mostly play to the
wide backhand to push the opponent into one corner or play to the COP to
limit the opponents power and the angle of play at the same time.

We should often use the COP against tall players. Tall players have the bad
property ( for us ) to have long legs and arms. If we try exploit our angle of
29
 play theyll sigh, make a half step and return the ball with an even higher
quality because they are anatomically able to apply more power. So if we get
the chance to play against Samsonov we keep that in mind.

We should never use the COP if the opponent steps around, instead we
play to the free side and score an easy point.

We shouldnt often use the COP against

small players. Contrary to tall players they have
small arms and legs. The short arms provide them
with a shorter time to switch between forehand
and backhand as seen on the right. According to
the old saying, theres no free lunch, theyre
exposed to other tactics, in particular playing the
maximum angle of play and playing away from the
table. By playing the maximal angle of play against
shorter players we exploit the combination of short
arms and legs which results in a short reach. Away
from the table we exploit this fact again and
benefit from the physical disadvantage in terms of
applyable power of short opponents.

4. Experimenting
To quote Sun Tzu,

The general who wins the battle makes many calculations in his temple before the
battle is fought. The general who loses makes but few calculations beforehand.

or phrased more modern in the so called 7p rule:

Proper planning and preparation prevents piss poor performance.

This quotes should remind us to do our tactical homework beforehand. We then

identify the playing style and play the standard tactic against it. A seperate article
how we exploit every playing system in table tennis will be linked here soon.

Sidenote 1 : If we want to extract fail-safe tactics against common playing

styles, its a good idea to study the Olympic,WTTC and World Cup Games in
the single elimination mode from Waldner, Zhang Jike, Liu Guoliang and Kong
Linghui.
Sidenote 2: The service variation will be discussed in a separate article Legal
service hiding 2 and linked here once published.

Now me might ask ourselves, why shouldnt we actively searching for personal
playing style flaws of our opponent?

30
First we assume to have a good opponent who knows how to play his playing style
and therefore isnt a wannabe looper who rips every ball into the net.

We then imagine our outcome for a experimental tactic, for example lobbing against
a two winged looper if we are a two winged looper aswell.

Two events can occur, we win a point doing so or lose it.

If we lose the point, the following might happened on the opponents side:

the opponent has a weakness for such balls and just hit it by luck ->
forbidden by assumption
the opponent just hit the ball by luck but has no weakness playing such balls
in general
the opponent is able to receive such balls very well

If we win the point, the following might happened on the opponents side:

the opponent just misjudged the ball but is generally able to control such
balls
the opponent cant play such balls -> forbidden by assumption
the opponent missed the ball because he was tired or in a mental hole

We therefore dont know which value our new information about this possible
weakness has. Its possible that he hits the next ten balls into the net because he is
in a mental hole or he could score ten points in a row. We will simply never know
what happened behind the curtain and what happens next.

On the contrary, the standard tactic against the playing system will always pose a
threat independently of our opponent.

Finally:

Exploit the playing system not the opponent!

For intermediate players this might sound a bit stupid, because they play against
intermediate players, who have many more or less obvious weaknesses. However,
the further we climb the ladder up, the smaller the weaknesses become until they
are hardly noticeable.

If we want to play consistently on a very high level, then we need to follow the
standard tactics against the opponents playing system and the only variation we
need is given in the Yomi section, namely variations which enable us to play the
maximal angle of play.

31
5. Summary

We read and understood the article and can now give a short outline regarding the
depth of our tactical/strategical/variational depth.

1. Know your own playing style and develop techniques for your most common
strokes to exploit the full theoretical angle of play to be unpredictable (See
point two.).
2. Detect the opponents playing style and remember the standard (also called
cookie cutter) tactic against it.
3. Win.

32
 100%
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33
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36
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38