How often are you at the back in attacking formation, do a cross court drop, then become the front player immediately afterwards? Not often, I bet. Check out from ~ 3m57s here.
Neither new, nor uncommon. Often used when you have a strong preference of who is the front-/backcourt player. When the preferred front player is held in the backcourt, (s)he can play a cross smash/drop and rush to the net. Actually, I think I see it less nowadays than some years ago, but it's still present at all (most) levels.
Hah! I just KNEW the first reply would be I guess I should have also pointed out that jjs is preferred at rear court, hence more surprise in this instance.
I really like this sort of thing. Creates clear roles for both players. I think the only reason it worked in this situation was the JJS was quite short up the court and could perhaps have been expected to follow in some shots - I don't think he came right from the back which would have been more confusing.
I wonder if he aggressively moved to the front because he felt like his partner was expecting another smash from him, thus not fully ready for a net reply from the opponent to JJS' drop.
Possibly. I think its more related to the required movement of LYD when your partner hits a cross court drop - the natural movement is for the net player to back away from the net and cover their side. JJS is helping the matter by decisively coming into cover the net creating and easy rotation, rather than a difficult situation for LYD where he has no idea where to be or what to cover. Cross drops are very unusual in level doubles.
