Watching tennis is a lot easier than playing tennis. Watching the best players in the world play each other on TV, under the highest pressures is even easier. They are both playing high percentage tennis, with great ball quality and margins. Because they’re so skilled and smart, it makes the game look simple-it seems like players should make every shot, like there’s a lot of space on the court to hit into, like it’s obvious. But that’s not the case. Not the case at all. Every level up you go, the players have bigger weapons, and more and more shots are being punished by your opponent and the open court gets smaller and smaller. So if you want to move up in levels, you need to focus on ball quality and fitness but also your tennis IQ. 

            When you’re playing your equal, every decision matters. And most of us are trying to play offense, to some extent or another. When we play offense, we want to win those points- it’s a tough feeling when you miss an approach shot, or don’t do enough and get passed. But it’s an even worse feeling when you make a bad decision with the approach in matches where the winner will only win 5-10 more points than the loser. So let’s break down what an approach shot is- to me, it’s a shot that sets you up for the final shot of the rally which will either be the passing shot your opponent hits, or the volley you play. So this approach shot could be a traditional ground stroke, or it could be a volley where there isn’t an opportunity to put the ball away. To me, and according to the stats I have, you have a 68% chance of winning the point when your opponent hits a backhand passing shot, and a 55% chance of winning the point against your opponents’ forehand passing shot.

            I count passing shots when the player hitting the shot has a decent chance at deciding what they want to do. So of course, this is somewhat up to my discretion-but I’d say I count most passing shots but not all. I say approach the backhand at all times. You have a better % chance of winning the point, whether you’re approaching cross court or down the line. So that is the basic thought process- ‘when I have a decision of where to hit my approach, I’m going to the backhand.’ And now we’ve made up our mind, preemptively about how we’re going to handle attackable balls and low volleys from any area of the court. This is basic, like knowing we’d like to make 65-80% of our first serves. But then there are times to do something else.

            When you are able to play without thoughts of your technique, or smaller details like that, you should be actively managing the score and risks you are willing to take. So keeping the focus on approach shots, and agreeing that overall we’re going to approach the backhand most often, let’s talk about time to change it up. Before approaching the forehand, we have to take into  account that there are multiple ways to approach the backhand, we can play flat and fast there, or high and heavy, or slow, or we can use the drop shot. That’s a lot of ways to create chaos on their backhand side, so I would do any and all of those before I go to their forehand because I know the odds are in my favor, and especially starting a match I want to do the things I know are right and see if they can beat me. If they can’t beat me with their backhand, I’ll just keep going there. 

            Being up in the score is a great time to take one of these balls and approach to the forehand, but be ready to play a volley. You’re almost ‘ok’ with losing the point mentally when you do this- you’re just trying to keep them honest and give them a reason to question what you’re going to do with those mid court balls. I’d also go to the forehand when I feel like I’m losing against the backhand or that I’m approaching the backhand in the same way over and over again and giving them a good rhythm. Good players, especially players better than you, will get a rhythm on their passes and eventually be able to ‘freeze’ you at the net and turn the odds in their favor. When this happens, the attacker starts to press and spray approach shots because they’re trying to ‘do more’ and that’s how matches turn. The attacker starts doing too much because the defender got a read on the approach shots. Most times, this is more an emotional feeling of what’s going on than a data-driven decision, remember that winning 60% of attacking points means you will lose 40%. Don’t get discouraged or change tactics if you lose a couple in a row, or get broken at an in opportune time, that’s what the game is.

91% of shots are landing inside zones B+C. When you play your equal, they don’t really have a weakness, there is no obvious place to hit the ball in order to gain control of the point. Because of this, we are forced to try and  create patterns to use in our matches-but against your equal, they can hit any shot from any location, making it nearly impossible to run a true ‘pattern’ in a match. So what we need to do is accept that every point is basically the same, and try to use our strengths in the most efficient ways possible. The best place to start thinking about creating offense is on the serve and return-if you do both, or either, of these things well in a match you will probably win. 

            Let’s agree that the player who wins any match, at any level, is typically the one who had a higher win percentage on their offensive moments. And that the goal of most players is to play offense, maybe not on the first ball of the point, but at some point inside the point, they want to play offense. So obviously the biggest separator in levels is the serve and return, which should be practiced accordingly. Don’t save serve and return for the last ten minutes of practice. Devote hours to them. And now, let’s forget about the reality of offensive situations earned as the result of a good serve and return. So how do we create offense from neutral?

            First, we have to know our game very well. A good way to learn this is to play a game I call 

 ‘+1 -1’ which scores like this: you earn a point when you hit a winner or force an error, and you lose a point when you make an unforced error. The game is played to +5 and -10. If your opponent makes an error, you do not gain a point, he or she loses a point from his or her current score. This game gets very mental, and causes a very similar emotional feeling to playing a match. There are no restrictions, but it’s clear that when you’re losing it’s probably you’re fault. Rarely does the game end with a player at +5. This game will teach you what your strengths are, and from there you can develop an identity and game plans. 

            Games like this reveal how hard it is to create offensive situations without making mistakes, and often bring out traits and skills that players aren’t fully embracing. We become more willing to come forward and approach the net to try and gain points through forcing an error, we use our slices and our ability to change speed, spin, shape and depth of our shots to probe our opponents. Recognizing that missing a slightly defensive shot will hurt us, making us lose a point, we play with more height and margin on defense-sometimes even just giving our opponent a put away shot rather than slapping one because ‘we’ve lost the point already.’ Taking more pride in our game, and demanding a certain amount of control over our shots, decisions and emotions helps us improve rapidly. Now once we’ve played this game a bunch, we start to find what actually works for us. And now we have realistic things to work on in practice.

            From this game we may realize that actually our backhand down the line is a great tool we have to catch our opponent cheating- so that is a tangible area to spend time practicing. Because we’ve recognized that we like to change line when the ball hangs for a second and we can ‘freeze’ our opponent, that is the one we work on in practice. We don’t just commit to hitting a certain percentage of backhands down the line, we work on taking those ones that hang briefly down the line. We practice the way that we play, we build a style and embrace the complexity of ‘match-decision making’ into our practices. Of course this is just one example of how to use drills to reveal what we should be focusing on in practice, you can do this for any other shot in your game.

            If you recognize that 91% of shots are landing in B+C, and look passed the first 4 shots of a point, you will understand that nearly every point is the same. Past 4 shots, the point becomes a controlled version of the above mentioned ‘+1-1’ game and then the player with the most tools and the quickest mind usually wins. If you can’t out maneuver your opponent from a neutral position, the odds of winning that match are against you. Recognizing that we need more tools and more understanding sends us back to the practice court with renewed focus and vigor, there is no time for mindless hitting or avoidance of certain skills.

Tennis, like all sports, is not black and white. The current stats of the game are outdated and leave people with the wrong impression of what they’re really watching. The average fan doesn’t really care, and that’s fine, but when our recording of stats starts to negatively affect the kids who are trying to learn the sport and the coaches who are trying to teach it, I think some explanation is in order. 

            First off, tennis is a thinking game. The player has to be a problem-solver during the match and typically the smartest, craftiest, feistiest player wins. Second, you have to understand that what I’m talking about refers to players of ‘equal’ levels. So what I’m about to write applies to Casper Ruud versus Hubert Hurkacz, but not necessarily to Casper Ruud against Jody Maginley, ranked #1199. Ruud and Hurkacz play at a similar ball quality leve, similar anticipation skills, serve and return are similar, court coverage is similar but both are head and shoulders above Maginley, making one a matchup of equals and the other very lopsided. 

            A knock off volley into the open court and backhand down the line winner on the 7th shot of a rally should not be counted as the same ‘winner’ on the stat sheet. The volley is merely put into a wide open court with an opponent who is not even running for it, while the backhand is hit against a player who is in good position and currently engaged in the rally; I call this a ‘ready opponent.’ To hit a winner past a ‘ready opponent’ is very difficult. The way that I watch matches and chart winners and unforced errors is very different from the way the two plays are currently recorded on the stat sheets available during and after matches. 

            Winners, for me, only come against ready opponents. On average, I count about 3.5 winners per match of two equal opponents. Challenger and ATP level, the average is the same. If we operate with this as truth, then we realize our gameplan should probably not revolve around hitting winners, but more around forcing errors. The good news is, there are a lot more ways to force errors than there are ways to hit winners. We can force errors with our movement, with any of our shots, with our ability to pressure our opponents, with the ability to bait them into bad decisions. We can really only hit winners by hitting the ball harder and playing more effective serve+1 tennis; which is limiting because it’s very hard to actually increase your power and speed on groundstrokes. It’s still difficult, but much more attainable to go on court and work on ways to force an error. 

            Understanding this truth about the game will help you self-diagnose what’s happening not only in your matches but in the overall growth of your game. When you play someone who is levels below you and hit more ‘winners’ and find your strengths overwhelming them, you will know that it’s because they can’t hang with you inside B+C, not because your strengths were extra strong that day. Likewise, when you play someone that is your equal or better, you will no longer leave the match feeling like your strengths aren’t good, but with the understanding that it’s probably your ability to force errors that is lacking. Thus giving you something more concrete to go back to the practice court and focus on. Don’t just look at the stat sheet at the end of matches and let that dictate what you need to work on, think about your game and go from there.