Hey guys!
We recently released a video on the backspin ghost serve and received many requests to make a similar tutorial looking at the reverse pendulum serve, so now we have! The reverse serve is used by many of the worlds top professional players such as Timo Boll and Fan Zhendong, it can be extremely effective when executed well and gain you weak returns and even outright points. So we’ve created this guide to the serve so you can master it too, we have 5 simple steps that you can follow to add this lethal serve to your game. We also recently teamed up with professional player Par Gerell, who is known as one of the best servers in the world, to create a serving masterclass course to take your serves to the next level, for more information on that click here!
The 5 steps
1) Develop the feeling
As with many serves getting the feeling and understanding needed is a key area to start off, so spend time practising and developing a good understanding of the wrist movement and mechanics of this serve. First start square to the table which forces you to isolate the wrist on it’s own without any body movement and feel how the wrist should be working. Ensure you bring the wrist back to the body and then release it forwards towards the net.
2) The technical points
The second stage once you have a good grasp of the wrist movement and have a good feeling with it, is bringing it to the table into a service action. So now we need to be side on to the table and are looking for the same wrist movement but now adding in the forearm for stability and control. Now we also concentrate on bringing the elbow higher to create space for the back-swing and wrist movement.
3) Body movement
The next stage to a deadly reverse serve is adding the body movement and rotation, this is vital for a number of reasons. Firstly without any body movement the serve can become tense and lose it’s fluidity, by rotating the waist and shoulders back and then turning them forward as you contact the ball it makes a smooth and stable service action. Secondly with a good body rotation in the serve you can achieve a much better finishing position to be ready for your next shot.
4) Changing the spin
Now we move on to crating different spin the reverse serve, with this style of serve you will always generate side spin but you can create sidespin/backspin and sidespin/topspin. To do this the focus is on the contact point of the bat and ball, in our side by side comparison in the video you can see the key differences in contact between cutting under the ball more for backspin and brushing around the side more to create more topspin.
5) Overview
It’s important to remember that service is one of the only areas you can easily practice on your own, so take time to focus on serves which are such an important aspect at any level of the sport. Be sure to try and understand which stage you are at with the reverse serve and really master the wrist action and body movement before moving on to changing the spin and direction.
At the TableTennisDaily Academy we have over 100 coaching videos covering technical, tactical and psychological aspects as well as in depth match analysis. As a member of the TableTennisDaily Academy you’ll also have full access to our “coach corner” which gives you the ability to ask questions that professional coaches Dan and Tom will answer. Whatever your questions, get swift and reliable coaching feedback you can trust right at your fingertips. You can even post videos of yourself in action for Dan and Tom to analyse, they will provide specific advice to help you take your game to the next level! So what are you waiting for, access your free trial today.
