At my club, in order to move up you have to play in a tournament and get 1st place against anybody else also wanting to move up. Unfortunately, they don't separate guys from girls and being a girl, the guys are a lot stronger than me physically and most are also older than me and have been playing longer. Any advice?
Singles or Doubles? You only list others strengths. What do you have (strengths and weaknesses)? And what weaknesses may they have?
It's singles. My private coach tells me i'm good at cross court shots and i play singles using mostly fast shots.
Is it possible that your fast shots are putting you in trouble? For example are you smashing a lot only to have them block to the net and put you in trouble? In that case you'll have to work the rallies a bit more and smash when it is most advantageous to you. How's your footwork, your net game, your accuracy and your defense? Which of these are assets and which are liabilities ? The very experienced BCers here are very smart and will be able to help if you give even more info.
I find this promotion system to be incredibly stupid. What happens if you've got two guys looking to move up who both happen to be better than people already in the higher group? Why combine male and females into the same tournament? Why not just select players for particular levels based on merit at the start of every season? Too many questions.
I agree. Mixing males and females competition is stupid. No offense to the female players. There are very strong ones, but at the 'same' level, males are physically stronger. How can it be fair to mix them up!
I don't smash a lot actually, because i was told not to. My footwork is mediocore but i'm working on it. My biggest liability is definitely defense.
My strength is probably speed and endurance but no matter how fast i am, most of the boys are faster without trying... Its ok. I'll just ask my coach then.
The way to beat these young boys is to be more consistent than them. You need to be fast, and to play simple, accurate shots. You must have a good defence, and excellent footwork. All of this is much much easier said than done! Good luck!
I'd say, first of all, mentally you need to stay strong. If you can be close to them in games, they may collapse on their own mentally, as they saw a girl "weaker" than them, and younger than them, but couldn't easily put her away. They may lose patience, and self destruct, whereas you have "nothing to lose", so to speak. You need to let go of the importance of these matches, and trust your training! Other than this mental aspect, you should spend some time observe their games, and perhaps even play with some of them, in order to find where they're weaker. Each one of them may have some different weaknesses. If you have regular training, maybe you can beat them after all, as most players in clubs are Doubles players. They may be good at smashing, but don't have good court coverage. In that case, you may lift to them, let them smash, and play a counter block to challenge their footwork. This of course assumes you can absorb their smashes to start with. You can think of other tactics to exploit their lack of footwork (e.g. play a shot to their forehand front, and then an attacking lift/push to their backhand rear court). If you net is better than their nets, you could use the net area more, and look for opportunities from their. If they're fast (movement wise, perhaps anticipating a lot), see if you can use deception, esp. in the net area to mess up their game (and their mind). You may be able to come up with other ideas. But the key is to come to the realization that they have weaknesses and strengths and you have yours. Figure all these out, have a simple game plan (perhaps with plan A + B) for each of them, esp. the ones you think are tougher. Good luck, and please let us know how it goes. How often do you guys have this kind of promotional matches, and when is the next one?
We have them every 3 months or so. The next one is in less than a month. Thank you so much for the advice guys! It was really helpful
the only way to get somewhere is to have proper coaching, if you are really serious about it. if you can't find coaching in Idaho, you can take a summer vacation and come to California and get some proper coaching here for three months, then go back and work on advancing again. either that or get some proper coaching anywhere in asia, and might be even cheaper for hiring a coach, but then you also need to factor in the travel expense and room and board!
Sorry I actually don't live in Idaho but my parents don't want people to know my location. I'm only 14 and my parents would never support me in that but that's a good idea. Thanks
The system is stupid, should be moved up depending on how good you are rather than winning a comp and there should be ladies/mens tournament. You need to be smarter than the men, use there power against them. If I was against you, I would be smashin a lot against you especially at you! So you needs to make sure you can get hard smashes back but more importantly be able to direct it whereever you want. One of the best places in singles to return a smash is a cross court net shot. This will really have them running off their feet to get it back in which you have the attack. Be faster, work on footwork and accuracy of shots. Do some drills on certain shots. Learn to read the game, this will help best of all! Find the areas where they struggle. Weak backhand? Do they struggle with loose net shots, do they struggle with a good clear, and then a fast sharp drop shot? Do they prefer a faster or slower game? If you play a certain shot, what is there most likely return. Very much like chess. Its good to be faster, better shots, etc but if you play wrong shot at wrong time, its all for nothing. Start watching matches looking at court from a players vision. And try to read the game. Try to guess the oponents return from statistics you've read from the game Good luck
Sometimes it might be tough to find your opponents' weakness quickly, as they will try to avoid playing those areas as much as possible. So, initially, find what they are strong at, and don't give them chances to play their strong shots. By the beginning of game 2, you should have more of an idea of their weakness and should play accordingly.
