I ran into an interesting situation the other day playing a game of doubles. One of my opponents setup to serve, I setup, and then they proceeded to not serve for 30+ seconds. (might have been a minute, whatever, felt really long at the time) While I've never officially looked up the rules on service time limits, we had a little discussion about how long you have to serve. His claim was you can take as much time as you wanted. Obviously this is absurd, as I could then delay games infinitely. At the time it wasn't worth arguing over, however here's what the IBF has to say about the time limit on serving: 11.1 In a correct service: 11.1.1 Neither side shall cause undue delay to the delivery of the serve. I suppose this sounds great if you are calling serves, but what if you are the players actually playing in a game. What is considered 'undue delay'? Anyone able to shed some concrete light on the situation? I'd also like to hear people's opinions on the matter. Thanks
Myself and the guys I play with regularly allow 20 seconds for serve... enough time to wipe the sweat off our heads, dry our hands on our shorts and get in position. I guess it doesn't really matter how much time you allow so long as everyone you plays with knows what the rules are and everyone is happy with them. His view of taking "take as much time as you wanted" just isn't on. Before you play again agree a time, when he starts messing around start counting the seconds out loud, when you get to the magic number (which you both decided on) he looses the serve. (Clearly you shouldn't do this when they've broken their leg and they're howling in pain.) When your playing people who aren't friends you can't define these rules. There's a few people I've played who like to tie laces at moments when I'm on a scoring run, maybe flap their t'shirt or give the shuttle a good check over and reposition all the feathers. In these situations I tend to turn my back until their done messing around and they then have to wait for me. I normally take this time to analyse what’s happened the past few points and what needs to be done to get the win. It's quite off putting to play to someone else’s timetable, so make him play to yours. Also, if every time they mess around they have to wait even longer they might stop doing it. This might be something you want to try if yourself and your friend can’t decide on a time limit for serving.
No no, what Maradona meant is that the opponent already took the serving stance and remained in that stance for 30 seconds or more. Well, technically thats a fault. If you can do that, you'll be seeing lots of world players taking 1 minute to serve on purpose just to regain some stamina. If I'm not wrong, there was a thread last time stating that it was five seconds. Ever since then I've been making use of the rule to throw my opponent's rythm by serving quickly or at the last moment. Five seconds is not a long time, but its long enough to throw lots of players off especially when they're on a winning streak
Normally, after getting in place to serve, you will be looking at approx. 5 seconds as the upper limit (one of the thread here actually had a response from someone who has done duty as a service judge - if not on the forum then it would be on badders.com) Before that (getting in place to serve), you normally have more time but obviously in competitions, you can't dilly-dally to your heart's content as the umpire would be on your case after a minute.
Other people in the club would be hopping mad about wasting court time. 30 seconds per serve and 15 points makes nearly 8 wasted minutes as a minimum. Might be cosidered as selfish.
yes, i believe the time limit is around 5 secs. I could be wrong but one of my coaches used it on me when i took too long to serve
See, that was my understanding as well. Actually when it happened, I told him I thought you only had 5 seconds or so to serve, however not wanting to argue and not having a hard copy of the rules kicking around, I didn't persue the matter. The interesting point of unsportsmanlike conduct is a good one though -- what he did was disrespectful to my team, as well as the people waiting for the court. (which there were)
Just make sure you time the interval with a stop watch, maybe use a bystander. You have to time a few services to back up your claim of the opponent taking >30secs holding the shuttle. By just waiting for the serve, 15 secs standing there waiting might seem more than 30 secs. i don't think it is disrespectful on your team. After all, holding the shuttle and waiting can be considered a tactic. But 30 secs is pretty long. Serving quickly is also a tactic so you can use that one on him.
Doesn't it look kinda "funny" when the four of you are standing sort of motionless for 30 secs of more, waiting for the server to serve since he already took a serving stance???? I would definitely call the server's attention whether it is legal or not. 30 sec is a loooong time.
I suppose a "reasonable time" normally taken by the server to start his service once the receiver is ready and 'both have taken up their respective positions', will have to be considered. But who is to decide what is reasonable time.? 15 secconds or 30 seconds deemed reasonable by the server or the receiver? Neither. It is the umpire who will make the final decision. So an experienced umpire is better placed to make such a judgement. A server may deliberately 'prolong' the service by holding on to the shuttle and not hitting it until the receiver shows signs of impatience with the purpose of gaining a psychological advantage. If this persists and causes undue delay and advantage to the server, then the umpire's judgement will be called to the test.
Although the IBF rules don't state 5 seconds as a limit, that is what is actually used in IBF tournaments. In other words, you wouldn't have been helped by waving the rule book...
I guess this 5 serving rule can be eased a bit for recreational play. I can understand how one might get irritated if another takes a lifetime to deliver a serve IN a competitive event (considering he knows about the 5 sec "rule"). In recreational play, I know tons of players that actually take their time serving (let's say 5-10 seconds). Because I play both competitive and recreational, I can usually adjust from a competitive mode to a rec mode therefore waving the 5 secs rule when I know my opponent is just out there to play for fun. There are times though when I know the opponent is taking his tiem on purpose, trying to irritate me, and since I have more of a competitive spirit in me, I'll be waiting there and sometimes I think he's going to serve and I make a movement (whether it's a studder step or something) and I'll be called a "fault" (in my mind). All in all, I think that in competitive play, around 5 seconds should be right. But when speaking of recreational play, I still think there should be a time limit, but it can be expanded. (5 seconds is already a long time in my mind).
According to my experience as an umpire, it is clearly visible when particular player serves too early or too late and makes his opponent confused. I have never counted the seconds, but I am confident that you can easy feel that preparation has right or wrong timing. In such a case, it is recommend to ask the player not to do it (after the rally) and if he/she doesn’t change – ask again, warn, etc. Of course in the recreational play where there is no umpire you can ask your opponent to be quicker or slower, but you hardly can warn him… regards, dzgdz
If this is recreational play and that there is time limit to the badminton session, let this fellow know as a friendly notice that the more time he makes everyone wait for his service is time he is wasting everyone playing. It might even be easier to get someone off court to time him and yell at him for wasting everyone's time, not just the players. I've only played with one player in the past who took a long time to serve (not 30 seconds but maybe close). Since it was only recreational play I told him not to waste our time with such silly antics, and just play. He continued, and I walked off the court. It's not any important game so why bother putting up with that crap. Life's too short.
