Hello, As suggested by the moderator, I'm dividing my previous thread. A lot of people gave me nice advices already in the previous one though. What should I do when I have the attack backwards ? I usually smash as soon at the opponent lifts but it doesn't seem effective (maybe weak smash). People always tell me to "build the point". Some players told me I should clear to "build the point". But I've been trying to change and use more dropshots, especially slices and cross dropshots but it's like I'm doing that randomly with no plan. Maybe I should try something like drop shot/drop shot/smash ? Or smash/smash/reversed-slice ? What should I do when I'm late or off balanced on a clear/lift ? I usually do a drop shot or a crossed drop shot. Is it okay ? But when the shuttle is lower in the backcourt, I don't really know what to do. Thanks.
Smashing alot is good but smashing as soon as the opponent lift is bad. If you do so, its pretty obvious & the opponent will get both their stance & mentally ready for your smash. In the end your smash fail to break them or put them under preasure. Having variation of shot will makes you less predictable. When i see the opponent in defensive position but abit to the back, i will drop or smash with stepper angle. The opposite if they are abit more in the front, i will lift up high to the back or smash hard to their body. Or if both in a good position, i will play it in the middle, making confusion between them about whos gona take the bird. Basically play an unpredictable shot & force them to do bad return that you can exploit into hard smash finishing blow.
I play XD many years with a fixed partner. Your questions are familiar to me when I started to play XD more serious and beside that this discipline is very tactical, most people are not very helpful, because in many heads XD means to them that the female sit on a camping chair at the net and the guy does anything else. That's not the way to play mixed doubles. But does you face such opponents or does they play an advance mixed doubles game with with genderspecific rotations and so on? What about yourself? Sorry for asking that questions but to me this is important to give you my best possible advice. For your smash I quoted myself. Could be helpful to think about this for your own game: I quote my coach for mixed doubles. Maybe this helps, she said to me following: "Use the whole court. Don't play only clears, drop shots and smashs. Use rarely, but sometimes a bad tactical shot according to your general game to interrupt the reading of your opponents." This sentence may sound a bit simple and maybe stupid, but it affected my game much. I was the player who played the same shots to specific areas. I always attacked with smashs. I targeted only this areas, but forgot the whole court to use. I also discovered that there is no no-no shot in XD. It's maybe wrong for the moment to use it, but every shot even clear with tactical intentions can be very powerful in XD. Building the point means to me, that I try to create misunderstandings for weak replies, I try to make the opponents move to create gaps to exploit. Play between them, keep the shuttle flat, built the game at lower pace to surprise your opponents, when you accelerate it from a pushing and moving. Never play a fast game like 3 smashs and than go slower. It's more comfortable for your opponents to come from a fast game into a slower one, than beeing used to the slower one and get surprised with pace they didn't awaited. Always play for the lady. It means that your lady has the tasks to finish the rally, initiate or keep the attack. Play for the lady and the winner from her, not forced the winner from your smash. In advanced mixed doubles the smash is just a tactical shot to built the game or the finisher, when you made anything right to get oppnents out of position, made them open the court for you or are both crowded at a spot due misunderstanding. I can' tell you which shot you should use. I use every shot when I see a chance to create something. That can be very opponent specific. Don't make the error and allow you only to play this and that shot. Any shot in your tool box is useable, you need to practice and make own experience to see when it is the right time for it to play it. If you would play me in XD, you can be sure that me and my partner will discover early and see/read what options you can only play. Trust me my partner will be ready to take your dropshots at emergency above the tape and know the area where the shuttle cross the net. If she won't be there, trust me, I will because I can smell it. If you play opponents with these lady at the net XD the man at the back all time, you can't be loose or messy with your drop shots. I suggest for that way to drop straight, but faster with landing more deep, but steep in the court. This will create the situations that the lady thinks "Oh, faster and behind me I can't take it." The male will think "Oh thats so close behind my lady I need to come more forward and take the shuttle low. Never play cross court in against this mixed blind, just when you see the lady is commited to the straight and you have a fast drop shot to a gap. If you play and advanced mixed which stand in defence and don't anticipate your shot, punch clearing over the lady can be often beneficial. The male needs to run around her and can have a bad angle and late contact. Or the ladies will start a clear duell from lady to lady to come forward when one has caught the other. Droping in the middle is also beneficial, but always point to the male, the lady will be biased more in the front. The drop shot should point from her away, which makes her open the court or you pull the male to the net. I wish you would say more about your lady, her skills, when do you loose the points and what type of XD you face as default. The low level camping chair mixed, or and advanced and well communicating mixed which knows to get into the gender specific strenght but also know to defend side by side? At the moment I can just guess and maybe some things are not helpful. I can suggest an exercise I prefer to do. I ask two club mates to try to counter attack me. I have the mid and the rear court. They are allowed to play any shot from their defence position in the mid and rear. I need to make the point with attacking shots or flat game. I normally pick two club mates (normally my female partner and another male mixed player I do sparring with) at my level who are able to make it difficult for me. If I'm late I normally clear, the rally is over. The aim of the exercise is to make me run in these areas and still have the time to control the shots to not loose the attack, but still play high quality. It also trains to a high pace situation to train your eyes to see the gaps, create the misunderstandings during attack. They try to keep it flat, to prevent my from smashing. There are rarely lifts from them. More pushs or driving. I need to built these lifts from this circumstance. It helps me alot to keep cool at higher pace and be patient.
@ucantseeme Wow thank you so much for your very detailed answer !! I'm sorry, when I divided the thread I didn't put all the infos back. In the original one I said I started playing badminton like a year and a half ago and games about 8 months ago. Recently, I've been taking private lessons but for singles. In the French ranking you start NC, then P12, P11, P10, D9, D8, D7, R6, R5, R4, N3, N2, N1. I'm D9 now but I'm not sure it means anything to you. I think I should work on my smash, I've never thought about trying to vary just for 30 cm like you mentionned or aiming for the shoulders, etc... I usually avoid to smash on the body but it seems a good tactic. But I'm not sure I can even do that, I should train. Also, I think my smash is weak. I thought it was nice but I used to play against beginners. I still struggle a little bit when I try to smash with a foream rotation and tightening the grip before the impact. A more experienced player told me I shouldn't bother for now about rotating my forearm for the smash... I face all sorts of opponents. Some who plays like a level doubles, some who plays with the woman always at the net, etc... But as I'm in another category now, opponents play more like "on TV". But in my club, I usually train with beginners/intermediates because the very good players stay between them... Actually, I've been struggling to get a fixed partner. I used to have one, everything was perfect for the positionning, then she decided to focus on level doubles so I played with a different female partner every week-end.... Then my first partner came back but as she started level doubles she doesn't want to leave the backcourt when she's pushed over there... Even high shuttles in the middle, she wants to take them only to make a clear which is too short... It's not easy because with all of my partners I've tried to explain that if I get flicked at the serve, they should move towards the centre of the court. Some yell at me because I'm at the back and didn't run to take the dropshot from the opponent afterwards... I tried to teach them about moving a bit backwards from the serve line on the same side when the opponent lifts on me and moving a bit forward when I play a drop shot, always have the racket up, etc... but they never apply this. Ahah shame on me for criticizing my partners... But usually, they either want to play like a level doubles or stay entirely at the net which I find difficult when I have to defend. I've tried to explain about trying to intercept, most of the times they go for a tight net shot or wait for a shuttle high enough to kill. With my current partner, we play front/back when attacking and side by side when defending. But she tends to steal the shuttles in the middle (she's left handed and I'm right-handed) and then she's stuck at the back. I've told her in this case, she should move towards the net and leave me the shuttle. When she gets flicked, I take the center but she never rotates to come to the net. She said she feels useless when I'm at the back... But I see a lot of players in my club who've been playing for like 3 or 4 years who don't even know how to position themselves and when I try to explain, they either don't like it thinking I'm a "macho" or they say they have more experience or they don't want to bother xD I live in a small city so it's not easy to change for another club. So maybe there's a partnering problem. But I've realised I didn't move fast enough backwards. I played yesterday and tried to react faster when I move to the rear and it was easier to deal with the lifts. But when my partner serves and the opponent makes a lift, I don't see the shot of the opponent because the body of my partner hides it. Maybe I'm in the wrong place behind her. I thought I should move but I fear leaving a side uncovered. I mean, sometimes my partner serves towards my opponent, not at the "T" but on him and I have no vision of the shuttle at this specific moment. I also tried some variations, drops see much more effective than smashing all the way and even crossed clears as you mentionned, my opponents were surprised with no one to cover the spot. "Never play a fast game like 3 smashs and than go slower" Did you mean a slower smash or slower shot ? Because I've been very successful with fast smash/smash/drop. @kwun Yeah, I've been thinking about recording myself but I have an old phone... and non of my partners want to be recorded
You may also be giving off that impression when you ask/tell people to take the front so you can take the back. Be careful about the words you use and they way you phrase things - it's a very delicate subject and there are a LOT of men who do not like being the front player because they feel it's the 'weak' player's position. It's worth saying to your partner that if they are the net player in the front feeling useless because all the shuttles are going over them, then they are doing a perfect job as net player. They are appearing so strong at the front that opponents do not want to risk playing it to them, and see the back player as the weakness. If they feel useless because they keep losing points at the front e.g. missing net shots/pushes/drives...then they need more practice as a doubles player, not just as a front player. At a higher level even up to pro play, the play is often dominated by the whoever has the stronger front player. Kevin Sukamuljo, Zhang Nan, Hendrawan Setiawan for some recent examples of extremely quick, tactical front players who make or break a match. For Zhang Nan in particular, if you look at the professional players' forum, you will find constant reference to how his rearcourt partners let him down, because he shines so strongly at the front, but the rearcourt player must be able to support the front player adequately. To go to mixed doubles as a more relevant example - Zheng Siwei is a monster of a backcourt player, there is no doubt - but focus on Huang Yaqiong I'd you haven't before. She is EXTREMELY fast and EXTREMELY good at reading her opponents. HYQ is as vital to the partnership as ZSW is. In fact...a lot of criticism of ZSW is that he's actually quite weak at the net compared to his competition!
Oh I see, I've never thought about it this way. I usually like being at the net when I play levels. I like trying to intercept but yeah, some players find this boring and frustrating. But I think a lot of players prefer to hit the shuttle than being good at pressuring the opponent. Each woman of my club prefers levels than mixed. I will pay more attention to Zheng's partner. So far I've watched mainly Arisa Higashino and I feel like she covers every spot. I wouldn't like to play against her because I feel I would have to lift everything ahah I was thinking maybe I should try for a while to play mixed and level doubles without smashing to force me to find other shots or angles ? I tried it yesterday, my female partner was happier because she played more but I felt like I lifted too much. I was doing this sort of very low forehand clear on the opponents and they were surprised by it, just above their arm when it's raised.
So I've been trying to play without smashing. I have to admit attacking clears work wonder but I don't know if it's a good idea to rely on clears. But what I've noticed is that the game is much slower and longer and my partner gets more fun as she hits more shuttles. But the funny thing is when I try to add real smashes or stick smashes, it doesn't work anymore... It's like I play better without using these two shots. What the hell ? Maybe I use the wrong shot : especially on the sidelines, when I'm a tad late, II usually do a china jump and a straight stick smash. I feel like it's not a good option. Don't know why... but each time I do this I feel I don't get any advantage. I also try to avoid drop shots on the sideline of the opponent because my partner gets a crosscourt net shot back everytime and we lose. But I feel like I should avoid drop shots and use more fast drop shots unless my opponents are in a bad position. For level doubles, it seems to be the opposite, works better when I use smashes mainly.
Adaptation/adjusting to different situation is the key. With my friend (i would say my best partner), a control type player. I could become a blood thirsty demon wanting to eat my opponent badly. I will smash more playing more aggresive atk & less carefull as i know my friend would be there to cover me & he able to keep up with my aggresive atk to cut any bad return. Other hand when im partnered with the same type player like me a back court atk player. I cant play aggresive like that. If both of us in atk stance we tend to forgot our defense as our bloodlust call for us. But when i play more variation it works better. When my partner is getting hot, i slow it down abit with clear or drop. Different story when i play with beginner. If i aim my big smash to opponent weak player it definitely a free point for me, but where is the fun on it. Other hand if i play fast bird with the good one, my partner would be just a spectator watching the bird passing his head over & over. So, slower play would makes him not just enjoy the game but also able to keep up the pace.
For me in mixed doubles an opponents drop becomes much more threatening if they also have a strong and accurate smash. Because then I can not try to just anticipate a half smash or drop as I'm forced to prepare for a full smash. This leaves me under pressure when the opponent does decides to drop especially if they have good quality on their drops. So as you can see, to really become effective at the rear court you need to be able to play a smash or drop of decent quality and then you can use variation of the two and the placement to put your opponents under more pressure and win more points.
Lol it really depends what you want here. Are you here to win? Or have a good time? If you're looking to have a good time, just laugh it off, because who cares. If you're here to win, either your partner's gotta change to a better one or that attitude of just camping at the back has to change. There's no hard feelings; not trying to be macho but if winning is the target. I must warn this isn't the way to play to make friends, but it is an effective way at an amateur level to win: Only at a strong level (minimum have won A's) does the following not work: (in that case, you can disregard the following) For mix, you can pretty much pile all the smashes on the lady player. Variation and placement does not matter, brute force is sufficient for like 90% of the cases. The late backhand you should do a fast clear to the opposing lady if they are in a sides position, or a straight block if they are in front back (only go cross if the lady is camping straight). The games are usually decided by who has the better net girl, and who can get the attack for the guy. I would basically forget about the punch clear since it is a shot barely used.
