Hi all, ive been playin badminton now 4 years. Self taught at start and just picked up tips from better ones along the way. The past 6 months Ive been getting coaching. Doin lot of drills for consistency and footwork. I have recently been taught about moving forwards a lot faster which i didnt know which I thought I wud share. The key is of course getting back fast enough so ur side on to shuttle and behind the shuttle. I used to do a scissors kick kinda thing where (right handed) I moved in a simple twisting jump movement my left and right leg around when hitting shuttle so right leg in the end was facing forwards. My coach says this is ok but its slow as my feet were still at the back of the court and I had yet to move forward when I had hit the shuttle!! He showed me where if u get back fast enough, you keep your left leg on the floor and move ur right leg forward when hitting the shuttle (like taking a forward step with racket leg) essentially making ur 1st movement forward as soon as shuttle is hit. I find I can take shuttle lot quicker at net due to this slight change. Hope that made sense lol
yeah, there's pros and cons to both. You have to wait longer to hit the shuttle if you keep your left foot floored so your opponent gets a bit more time to recover. You also get slightly more shot options if you scissor because you take the shuttle higher.
I've not seen this taught by any coaching organisation or international-level coach, and it seems to contradict some fairly basic coaching ideas that are taught by Badminton England. This method is sometimes called a "step-through". As far as I know, Badminton England consider teaching this only as a learning aid, with the idea that it should be replaced by the scissor jump ("kick-through") once the player is ready. I'm not convinced it improves recovery versus a scissor jump. When you land from a scissor jump, the left foot stops your backwards movement, and the wide base provides a stable platform for the forwards recovery. More importantly, the step-through inhibits body rotation into the shot, when compared to the scissor jump. You don't necessarily need to jump high for a scissor jump -- generally speaking, you jump just high enough to get your feet off the ground. If it works for you, then by all means use it. Personally, however, I can't recommend it and won't teach it until I see some evidence that it is used/taught at a high level of play. (That's not to say that you would always use a scissor jump when you have time. There are certain interesting exceptions.) This may be because you were landing in an unbalanced position after the scissor jumps, slowing your recovery. The scissor jump is a much more complex movement, and it's easy to land off-balance. It's not an easy technique to master. However, if you do master it, the scissor jump/kick-through provides very good forwards recovery. Quite often, players also use the scissor jump when they are too late, and should be using a step-out instead. This causes them to be off-balance during the shot, and late to recover as they are still off-balance after hitting -- the "falling out the back of the court" syndrome.
One more possibility: if you're finding the step-through more effective than the kick-through, it could be because you're racket-leg dominant. This is quite common. Being racket-leg dominant means that you use your right leg to do most of the work, and neglect the left leg to some degree. Such players typically have better motor skills with the right (racket) leg. If you're racket-leg dominant, then kick-throughs may not be effective as they require you to use your left leg effectively. The step-through, in contrast, completely neglects the left leg, and plays to the strength of a racket-leg dominant player. A better long-term solution is to remove the racket-leg dominance by training to use your left leg more effectively. This would take longer, however.
Very interesting gollum. My coach is a qualified coach here in Ireland and he himself plays at 1 of the highest standard here in NI. He has also played at the Irish opens etc and gotten to quarters etc I was quite slow at moving forwards from doin the scissors kick and therefore getting to net was a struggle for me and took at lot of effort. I find with this "step through" moving forward is lot less tiring and faster as I am already moving forward upon impact of the shuttle. Dont get me wrong, I still do the scissor kick and if I am late to the shuttle I will do this or the step back movement to hit the shuttle. I believe this movement is working for me and I feel faster on the forehand side (still cant do it on backhand side yet) but my coach believes I am getting faster and that this will improve my game
That happened to me. I used to tip backward (fall off the rear court) or at best flat (slight pause to restart motion) after the stroke. My coach has been correcting me to hurl my lower body (both legs) backwards so I am tipping forward when I land. That allows for much faster recovery.
I'm not casting any doubt over your coach's playing or coaching ability. I prefer to address the ideas, not the man. One thing to bear in mind is that the "scissor kick / scissor jump / kick through" need not be exactly the same in all circumstances. For example, in the backhand rearcourt, the scissor jump is often used in a less "stable" way, because this allows you to play a round-the-head forehand even when under pressure. In the forehand rearcourt, the scissor jump is often much more controlled -- because otherwise, you'd be better off using a step-out. These scissor jumps very closely resemble the "step-through" footwork that you are talking about. The main difference is this: with the step-through, your left foot stays planted on the ground; with the scissor jump, you get your left foot off the ground and free up your body rotation a bit more. In which case, you should probably stick to this new method, at least for a while.
This video shows what Gollum describes in post #7 of this thread. Now there are different ways to play the overhead shot depending on the height of the shuttle. The link is showing Hendrawan who IMHO has very good basic footwork. Although Peter Gade is also very good I would say he has a less orthodox footwork. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wx60gQJKKLo Watch the clip at 2.10 and 4.34. That is classic overhead technique footwork when you can get behind the shuttle. 1st one is forehand and Hendrawan use his body rotation to move forward. He's need to turn his body much more as he has played a high crosscourt clear. He then almost walks to the middle of the court, does a split step before moving for the next shot. and 2nd one is round the head. Note that for the 2nd one, Hendrawan performs a little skip before taking the big steps towards the net. This is extremely important for him to make up the diagonal distance. Hendrawan has time to do the skip because his choice of shot was the cross court drop. If he had played a cross court smash, there would have been no time for Hendrawan to cover the block return. Also note the path of the dropshot and where Gade meets the shuttle. If you extrapolate the shuttle path, it would land past the service line. There are a couple of things to note from that drop shot i) For that type of drop shot, it would be very difficult for Gade to play a very tight net shot. ii) Because Gade has to play a block shot far away from the net with a higher margin of error, the shuttle moves a little slower and takes more time. Just very slightly enough time for Hendrawan to read the reply. The round the head is much easier to play. At 4.38, Hendrawan cannot get back far enough and the shuttle is on his forehand side so he doesn't turn his legs for that smash. (Peter played a good block reply so Hendrawan had a little difficulty getting to the net.) Forehand is more difficult as you have found, especially if the shuttle is way over to the forehand side here's another clip showing Xia Xuan Ze who has very clear footwork. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wr-4W_OvJYw 1.55 - straight smash, scissor kick, left leg steps forward, then right leg forward ready to play net shot 1.59 and 2.02 - Drop with scissor kick, little recovery skip. For the 2nd drop, Taufik plays the net shot and can you see Xia use two very quick steps? Xia has actually changed the rhythm of his footwork. This is something that is trained deliberately. In fact, this whole rally is a very good demonstration by Xia of footwork and basic footwork rhythm. See the last shot at 2.14 - Xia speeds up the rally with a forehand halfsmash and drive changing the pace of shot. I think that's why Taufik made the error hitting the shuttle out. 3.50 - even Gill Clark comments on his footwork!
The 1st shot at 2.10 is pretty much the footwork ive been learning and the 1 I have been talking about from the start of the thread. I wud also use the footwork at 4.34 and all the rest of the footwork quite often but the 1st one was new to me!! And I find that If i can do this, going forward is more easier. Great find Cheung
It's worth noting that the high serve in singles is a special situation, as the player forced right to the back of the court. There do seem to be some interesting footwork differences in this situation. It may be that the receiver is forgoing some body rotation (which would be useful for a smash), so that he can get better recovery (there's no backwards momentum to stop, which is the strong point of a scissor jump in terms of recovery). (This is something I need to study more...) (Too many damn brackets. )
This type of footwork basically applies the principle of getting behind the shuttle early for the shot. By stopping backward momentum before playing the shot, and applying forward momentum just before hitting, recovery to the centre is much easier and the shot is more solid. The scissor kick is more useful when there is still a bit of backward momentum by the time you hit the shot. The movement causes a rotation of the body so that the upper body has some forward momentum (which improves the power in the shot) by trading a bit of extra backward momentum to the lower body. When you land, if you have springy legs you can bounce forward off the non racquet leg. This is a bit more complex movement than the other one. I don't think having the non-racquet leg planted on the ground is necessary. If you jump with both feet, then the footwork becomes that of a good jump smash.
If you think about it, this footwork does improve recovery. With a scissor jump, you can't begin moving forward until you land. When using a "step-through", you are already moving forward while you contact the shuttle. Ideally, I think that using both types of footwork at once is best (provided you have the time to do so). i.e. get behind the shuttle and hop forward as you hit the shuttle, doing the scissor kick as you do so.
All three replies are completely right. However, I really only advocate the step through, with left foot planted, as a training exercise for technique and not something to be used in games. For my descriptions, I have been referring to the basic overhead stroke which means the body/hips rotate and legs change position. If you do not have good technique at this point, your scissor kick technique is going to be less efficient. If you want good footwork and speed for the next shot, you need to understand where your centre of gravity is after you've played the shot. This is crucial for saving time accelerating to the next shot. It needs to be well forward of your hips after you have finished the stroke. Shoulder rotation in the overhead shot is another neglected area. I see many players using inadequate shoulder rotation. If you do not rotate your upper body, and therefore your shoulders, your centre of gravity will too high. I suggest initially practicing the overhead stroke and when you follow through, right shoulder is towards the net and left shoulder towards the rear of the court i.e. 180 degree rotation (or more if a cross court clear/drop/smash).
I agree, especially on the studying point. What I see is the top players use different forms of overhead. You can see Peter Gade keep an open stance without playing too much rotation even when the shuttle is very high and he has plenty of time. He uses scissor kick more when going for round the heads. I have always been very curious to see many top China women's singles players play overheads without rotating their legs. Yet again, one of the Olympic games videos you can see Setiawan clearly change his legs for very straightforward smashes from 3/4 half court position. What I think (this my own speculation) is that these players are at the top level and going back down to the basic technique is not always necessary for them. Analogy - like a Karate punch, the classic form of the punch is one way, but using it in practice when sparring the punch takes on a different form What I do know is if you master the the scissor kick from forehand court, and get all the components right of the overhead stroke with it, you can play to the any of the opponents four corners and the two sides using the same body motion introducing a tremendous amount of variation and disguise for the opponent to cope with.
Yes, I agree with that. I use the step-through (left foot planted) when I'm coaching the overhead hitting technique to beginners. It's a very simple footwork pattern that allows them to get the feeling of some body rotation in the shot, without having to learn the scissor jump/kick-through (which is much more complicated). As soon as we move on to footwork-specific training, however, I go directly to the scissor jump / kick-through.
