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Return Of Serve - make it count!Fill In The Form Below For Your FREE Top 10 Tennis Training Tips E-Course If the tennis serve is important because every point starts with one, then the return of serve is equally important for exactly the same reason (every point starts with someone trying to return service). Now, depending upon the level of tennis you are playing, the challenges you will face when trying the tennis return of service will vary. They will however be one of if not all of the following list: - Speed of serve Spin of serve (slice serve, topspin serve, kick serve) Placement of the serve One thing is for sure though, if you are unable to get a good percentage of your opponents serves back into play you will really struggle in the match. Let’s look at how you can overcome some of the above issues Returning a Fast Serve The thing about the fast serve is that the time you have to make the shot is short and so you will have to react quickly. When playing against a big server you have to learn to make your shot more compact as you will not have the time to take a big swing at the ball. So using a short backswing is one of the keys to facing a fast serve. The other alternative which is something you see many players including Federer and Nadal employ is to block the ball back. To do this just keep your tennis racket up and in front of you. All you need to do from there is step forward to punch/block the ball over the net (just like a volley). Just use the pace of your opponents serve to your advantage. The other alternative is to move back a bit to give yourself more time but as you will see that can cause you problems if they have a good variety of serves including any of the following. Returning a sliced serve, topspin serve and kick serve All of these spin serves present you with different problems. The slice serve can drag you wide and off court so even if you do return it you are leaving the court wide open (it can also swerve into your body and leave you with no room to make a shot). The key to this return of serve is to move towards the ball (in the direction of the spin) to cut it off thereby not allowing the side spin on the ball to push you off the court. The topspin serve and the kick serve are different in as much as they have a higher bounce than the flat (fast) serve or slice serve. The problem here is that if you wait to hit the ball at the top of its bounce it will be too high to get a meaningful connection on and if you move back to allow the ball to fall into a more “comfortable” position you could be too far back and out of position. Your best bet is to try and take the ball early and on the rise before it gets too high and out of your “strike zone”. Summary The best return of serve practice is to…………return serve. Just spend some time returning serve just as you would do hitting forehands and backhands. Try practicing against a variety of partners to broaden the types of serves you will face. Use your time wisely. Think about it, whilst you are practicing your return of serve, your partner is practicing their serve – both invaluable!
Take a look at this video of one of my juniors returning a second serve during a practise match. That's how to treat a weak second serve!!
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