What tactic should I use?

Tennis is a sport played by all, the short, the tall, the muscular, the slight, the old and the young. And the beauty of this is that each and every player offers a new challenge, a new set of obstacles to overcome and a new puzzle to solve. The big server, the net rusher, the forehand cannon, the baseline grinder, the slicer… the list goes on. With so many variables it is often hard to work out the best way to play a match, so here I go with my 5 tips for choosing and executing tactics:

1. Don’t forget the basics. No tactic can work without a ball in play. Regardless of what tactics you choose to play, no tactic can overcome inconsistency. So always start a match focusing on the basics, am I getting first serves in play and am I rallying to a suitable quality (depth, ball in play beyond the service line). We all need to settle into a tennis match and so getting the fundamentals on track is the place to start.

2. Play to your strengths and your opponent’s weaknesses. Most players prefer their forehand to their backhands. So, it would be madness to spend a prolonged period engaging in backhand rallies. Instead, why not focus on getting your forehand into play as much as possible… and to that end hitting to your opponent’s backhand. By doing that you are going to create the best ball (most difficult, don’t forget we are not in a match to be nice) for your opponent to deal with. If the weakness you see down the other end is movement, hit to the corners, if they are short hit balls high with topspin and if they hate volleying bring them into the net by playing dropshots. Remember your strengths though because if you have never hit a volley before you cannot now expect to be a jedi at the net so maybe that tactic needs to be left for another day and a new route to victory needs to be explored.

3. No tactic is right/wrong until you win or lose with it. Tennis is a game of trial and error. I see a lot of people playing their game i.e the style of tennis they have honed for years, hitting from baseline to baseline and not exploring much else because they are comfortable doing that and uncomfortable doing something else. That is not to say this is bad, there is a lot to be said for consistency and repeatability, however it is limiting. One day you will come unstuck, so tactics are all about being willing to change. Furthermore, if you give somebody the same ball to their backhand repeatedly, at some point they are going to get good at hitting backhands, so you may have to change your approach. Often it is tough to play a way different to your normal style and commit to it because it makes you feel slightly uncomfortable. But if you lose a set 6-4 and continue to play that same way, likelihood is you will lose the next one in the same way. Be brave enough to try something different and commit to it for a good period to give it time to work. And if you are leading ask yourself if you need to change things, logic will say probably not. We do not need perfect tennis to win a match, winning just over half the points will win us the match.

4. Don’t overcomplicate it. It is wrong to believe that you have control of everything on the tennis court because in fact you don’t and it is important to recognize this. You cannot control where your opponent hits the ball, how they hit the ball, the position of the sun etc. So to make a set of tactics for where you are going to hit the first ten balls of the rally is unrealistic as the rally will rarely play out the way you want for that long… after all the opponent is trying to make it tough for you too. Instead, your tactics need to be broader and simpler, for example serve out wide and hit to the open court, hit aggressively and take time away, out rally them with lots of height and depth on my ball. These tactics are not definitive because whilst we want to play tennis on our own terms it is not always possible and so we need to be adaptable, recognize I do not have complete control but when I do be brave and seize it.

5. Every match is winnable… but also losable. Never ever underestimate your opponent. Every player is beatable, we know this because every player on the planet has lost a tennis match. To win you might need to play a level of tennis you have never played before, but there is always a path to victory. That also means there is a path to defeat. There are no matches that you should win or should lose. If you pick a tactic and execute to a high enough standard you will win, if you don’t you will lose, simple. Some tactics may need a higher standard of execution to get over the winning line because they play to the opponents’ strengths, if your tactic plays to weaknesses, you will need a lower level of execution because hopefully it will elicit a miss or weak ball sooner. But nothing is a foregone conclusion, get out there be decisive in how you want to play and execute to the highest standard you can. Don’t bail from your tactic too soon, give it a chance to work and for you execute to a high enough standard and do not be the ‘grey man’… the tennis player with no identity, too scared to try anything in case it goes wrong. You have to get out there and win a tennis match… not avoid losing it.