Hey Dan, apologies on the delay I just had managed to look through the videos you sent in properly. This is great to see a couple of examples of you in matches so I can see what’s going on well. Love the shirt by the way! 😀
So for both the matches I think it’s quite similar the things to work on and improve. I think you were much more effective when you managed to play the first topspin, lots of them when you were in position you managed to a get a lot of spin and the opponents had a lot of trouble with that. I think just try to make sure you keep the strokes compact and not too long when playing this shot on both backhand and forehand, this will help you recover and be ready in position for the next shot if it comes back, then you’ll be ready to attack again and take advantage.
I think in the 5th sets you ended up going back to a more safe game and getting into pushing rallies more often which is a common thing that happens as you don’t want to be the one to make a mistake. So tyring to be brave and still go for the open ups where you can.
Against Jesse he seemed a lot more aggressive and the game got into more open attacking rallies which I think suited you better. You were very unlucky in this match with the let that came across as you were playing some nice backhands and then wet ball right at then end! I don’t think you played badly at all and there are a lot of positives to take from both of these games.
I think when in the open rallies a good focus for you is to try to target the opponents body/elbow more often to try to force a mistake or weak ball, this is something that works against all players and is really helpful. For the technical side I think when pushing just trying to take the ball early as much as you can which will help keep the ball low and allow you to add more quality on the shots as well.
In the open rallies trying to keep your shots short and stay relaxed is the main thing, this isn’t easy in matches and takes time to work on but it will help a lot and make you feel less rushed in the points, a great way to practice this is getting a practice partner to block for you anywhere in the table and you have to keep topspinning into heir backhand side, this helps work on the random switching and getting into position quickly! But a lot of good stuff here, hopefully a bit more luck on your side next time and this result will be different! Dan 🙂
