so a while back maybe two or three years ago I made a video about a trend on the
ATP Tour regarding the two-handed backhand and back then there was only maybe a handful
of players using a specific technique on the backhand that is sub-optimal and I can
tell you now this is not a trend anymore this technique has spread like wildfire
what I'm seeing now is Juniors and many players on the ATP Tour and even some on
the WTA tour using the following technique on the two-handed backhand and I'm going to explain to
you what that is so on the preparation stage players will point the racket towards the side
so this is very reminiscent of how you would point the racket on the forehand
so on the forehand the racket will go towards the side on many ATP players
and some WTA players now what you would normally see on the two-handed backhand
is a take back that goes further back where the tip of the racket is pointing straight
towards the back fence or on the WTA tour it actually points a bit more behind the body
but what you'll find now especially on the ATP Tour from players like Kyrgios, Berretini,
kachanov and the list goes on and on is a take back position that goes towards this side and
in today's video I'm going to explain to you why this is sub-optimal why it doesn't give you the
same range of motion as some of the greatest two-handed backhands in the history of the
game and most importantly I'm going to tell you why you shouldn't adapt this technique at the
recreational level and for what I'm about to explain to make sense you have to understand
the crucial difference between a forehand and a two-handed backhand these two things are not
alike because if I put my racket on the side of the body on the forehand I can still have range
of motion in other words the racket will lag behind not only the here but on High
level players the racket will lag behind all the way to here where the tip of the racket is
pointing towards the corner of the side fence now here's the problem if we take the backhand
as an example and we put the racket here this racket will not allow lag in the same way why
not because we have two hands on the racket there's limitations when it comes to their
non-dominant wrist it will not bend that far so what happens with players that start their backhands
here they get less range of motion some of them will remain on this side of the body and
some will go a little bit further back and this ultimately results in a stroke that's shorter
that has less acceleration and the reason for that is a reduction in the range of motion and
now let me explain the techniques of the current best two-handed backhands on tour I was always a
big fan of Alexander's Zverev's two-handed back and in my opinion it is top three in the world
of course everybody knows that Novak Djokovic has the best two-handed backhand of all time but I'm
also going to include Rafael Nadal the player with a phenomenal two-handed backhand what you
will see all these three players do is put the racket further back in their take back position
and what naturally happens from this position is
the racket will drop before it starts to go back to a neutral position here
so take a look at the range of motion going from here to here to here versus starting on
this side and then going towards the ball like this even if the racket drops there's
simply not enough room for the racket to accelerate so what you will see from
players like Kyrgios or kachanov or beretini is that the backhand looks short stiff and rushed
yeah now I know what you're thinking Nick these players are making millions of dollars with their
backhands they have really fast backhands that can hit backhand winners no doubt about it they still
have extremely good backhands I'm not saying that these backhands are bad and in fact this technique
might be adequate in certain situations let's say you're playing on a super fast indoor court or on
grass or you're returning a ball that's very deep and flat or you're returning serve a reduction
and the take back is going to work out just fine however when you don't have those things this is
where these type of backhands look more forced and if you want to take a look on YouTube at a
backhand that was mishandled by berretini with this technique this happened on Match Point
against Andy Murray in the fifth set of five four Berretini had the entire court open had a
two-handed backhand in the middle of the court and he did one of these backhands and of course
he didn't get enough range of motion on it and he dumped it into the net so what I'm saying is
the following this backhand technique can work even at the elite level however if we compare
it to the greatest two handed backhands in the history of the game or currently the greatest backhands
on tour we see a different technique it is one where the range of motion is greater the racket
has more room to accelerate and we take a look at these backhands for example zverev or Djokovic it
me just say that this type of technique can work at the elite level but I'm here to tell you
that at the recreational level where two-handed backhands are something that's very difficult to
adapt to a lot of recreational players who started playing tennis later in life is that if you adapt
this technique let's say you want to copy Kyrgios or berettini you start your backhand from here you
are bound to have big issues with your two-hander because generally at the elite level there's a
tremendous amount of pace and players can just absorb that pace and send the ball back pretty
fast with this type of technique but you at the recreational level you're dealing with less Pace
coming at you and for that reason if you shorten your take back and you start right here it's going
to be very difficult for you to get any type of power on your two-hander so what you must do is
point the tip of the racket towards the back fence a la Djokovic you have to start your backhand like
this now on the WTA tour you don't see this technique too frequently yes there's a few
players that do it but the vast majority of wta players who have fantastic two-handed backhands
take the racket at least towards the back fence and some of them will take it even behind the
body like this and it's super important for you to understand the context of the situation that you
find yourself in on the court so yes you will see even Djokovic take his racket back here from time
to time if he's returning serve or if a ball is coming at his feet he won't go all the way back
so the context is super important you're going to have your regular take back that goes to about
right here but there will be some scenarios where you will have to shorten it depending on the pace
of the incoming ball and the depth of the incoming ball and so on but your regular bread and butter
take back it cannot be here it has to go further back for the reasons explained in this video
and you're probably thinking Nick are you saying that the technique is getting worse on the ATP
Tour how can the technique be regressing isn't supposed to evolve and get better and better
as time goes on well generally yes but in the case of the two-handed backhand I have to tell
you no because it doesn't make sense from a biomechanical standpoint no matter how much
you try to get range of motion for heat you just simply won't because you have two hands
on the Racket and that non-dominant wrist is blocking the racket from going back so
this is a sub optimal technique and yes this is not an improvement in technique this is a
negative Trend that's happening on the ATP Tour and you're not going to argue with me
when I tell you that Novak Djokovic Alexander Zverev possibly the two best two-handed backhands
on tour do things differently yes Kyrgios berettini and kachanov with this technique
still have Elite two-handed backhands that won them millions of dollars and they're
still incredible backhands I'm not saying that but compare the backhand of Kyrgios to the backhand
of Djokovic and there is no argument in my mind that djokovic's backhand is better