Hi guys and welcome back to Badminton Insight
So in our recent video on how to choose a racket and giveaway
almost half of you wanted to know how to perfect your backhand
and rightly so as it's one of the hardest areas of badminton!
So in this video we're going to teach you how to perfect a backhand drop,
a backhand clear and a backhand smash and even if you can already play these
we're going to give you tips on how you can improve your technique, your shot
accuracy and your power to give you the perfect
backhand! We're going to cover the footwork, the grip and the hitting
technique of the backhand and explain how the backhand smash drop
and clear all need slightly different techniques
to play them perfectly! Now there is going to be a lot of information in this
video and we don't expect you to be able to
implement everything straight away you might need to learn some of the tips
implement them, perfect them and then continue adding until you've
got the perfect backhand so without further ado let's get to it!
Firstly it's really important to look at our footwork and positioning on the
court the best players do this really well so
it's no surprise they also have great backhands!
The footwork will be the same for the three shots. So as soon as your opponent has
hit the shuttle you want to split step in the direction you want to travel
you want to then chasse with your non-racket leg leading
and then pivot so that you're facing backwards
and this chasse will depend how tall you are or how far you need to travel
You want to split that in the direction you want to travel, you then want to chasse with your non-racket leg leading and then pivot so you're facing backwards! knowledge
For example as you can see here
Viktor who is very tall is in control and therefore he only takes one very
small chasse, in comparison Tai Tzu Ying is a smaller
player therefore she needs a much bigger chasse step
especially when she's under pressure like she is here
So after you've done your pivot and you're facing backwards you want to
lunge with your racket leg hitting the floor
at the same time as you hit the shuttle after this you then want to push off
your racket leg so that you're facing forwards again
these are two very important points which we'll talk about a little later
So moving on to grips you'll have different thumb positions on your racket
depending on where you're taking the shuttle, for example if you're taking it
out to the side of you or in front of you
like in a drive or a lift you would use a standard backhand grip
with your thumb on top. And if the shuttle is behind you
like it should be when you're taking a rear court backhand shot then we'd use
what's called the v-grip the bevel grip or the
universal grip. We call it the bevel grip because where the flat part is on the
grip and then there's little ridge here or the bevel that's where you place your
thumb and if the shuttle is really far behind you
then you should move your grip round to a panhandle grip
and these different types of grips will help you play more accurate and
powerful shots depending what position you're in. A final point is that your
grip has to be relaxed only squeezing it at the point of
contact but more on this in the next section
So there are four key points to the preparation of these three backhand
shots. Firstly despite what you might have been
taught you shouldn't start with your elbow high
like this, as you can see from these clips the professionals are all starting
with their elbow around the bottom of their ribs
this is because starting with your elbow high means you can only generate
power from your shoulder whereas starting with your elbow low
and bringing it high means that you can use your body
and also your legs to rotate and give you power. Secondly you should have a
relaxed arm and grip during the preparation as this will help
you generate power. It's kind of like golf! The more tense you are generally the
less power you're going to generate
Whereas if you're nice and relaxed you can generate more power
One common mistake when playing a backhand is your body positioning
you don't want to be too tucked in and hitting the shuttle too closely to you
as you don't have the room to swing, you also don't want to be too far away with
your arms straight meaning that you lose control. You want
to be in a position where your arm is slightly bent upon the
point of contact. It's kind of like throwing a punch in
boxing you don't want to punch with your arm tucked in
as you won't be able to generate enough power however you also don't want to
punch when your arm is straight you want to
have a slight bend upon the point of contact
Finally the preparation of your backhand drop clear and smash
should all be the same this is so your opponent doesn't know what you're
playing until the very last second. Many people make their shot choice
obvious reducing the effectiveness of the shot
you should play a back and drop when you want to neutralize the rally and not
give the attack away, for example like you can see here the
opponent isn't pressurising the front court and therefore it's a good option to
play the drop now for every backhand shot your racket
leg should contact the floor at the same time as you hit the shuttle
and this is so that you can adjust right until the last minute as to where
the shuttle's going and also use this leg to help you
generate power in the shot. So in your swing you need to track the
shuttle from where it's coming from and then pull your wrist a little bit. If
you keep your wrist flat then your strings are going to be
pointing outwards and you're going to be hitting the shuttle like that
meaning there's a greater chance that it will go out! So
track the shuttle, bend your wrist a little bit and then you as you hit the shuttle
your racket shaft wants to be vertical like this
not like this or like this and your strings facing
forwards to where you're hitting the shot if you go for a cross-court shot
then at the last minute you'll turn your strings slightly towards the cross!
For the drop shot you should try and keep the shuttle on your strings
longer than the smash and clear, you also don't have to hit the shuttle at its
highest point, you can let it drop a little so it's in
a comfortable hitting zone. These key points will help you remain in
control of your body and have a fluid swing improving the
accuracy of your shot. You can practice all of these shots by
pushing the shuttle to a feeder so you're out of position and then getting
them to lift flat into your backhand corner
like you can see now. As you can see I did some cross shots as well as straight
shots and to do this I altered the face of the
racket at the last minute in the direction I wanted the shuttle to travel
so despite playing a slower shot you still want to recover quickly and you
might want to move more towards the net as you anticipate this is where the next
shot will be. Now the backhand clear is the shot that
everyone in the world wants to be good at. We should use this shot when we're in
deep trouble and we want to reset the rally and buy
ourselves some time. It can also be used when we feel our opponent is really
pushing up to the front of the court and we want to push them back
There are two main technical differences between the backhand drop and the
backhand clear and these both relate to the power
firstly you need to really squeeze the grip
to generate the power and secondly you need to use your body to generate the
power like shown in these clips
So similar to the drop you need to have a flat racket face as you strike the
shuttle. If you slice it then you're going to
lose accuracy and also lose power
and as you can see from the clip of Viktor when he hit the cross court
he obviously altered the strings to face that way however he still followed
through in the direction of the cross-court shot
so, again make sure that your racket leg is
landing just as you are hitting the shot to help with the power
and stability of your body, that you're making contact with the shuttle at
the optimal point and that your arm is relaxed and
slightly bent before contact. As we mentioned you might use a clear to
get yourself out of trouble so when recovering out of the shot you
should recover more defensively than you would out of a drop or a smash
The backhand smash can be used if you're taking the shuttle slightly earlier than
the drop or the clear, it can be used to put the
pressure back onto your opponents and maybe even catch them by surprise!
For the back and smash you need to have accelerated movement and body rotation
needs to be quicker taking the shuttle a little earlier like
Jen said. You also need to develop that forearm rotation to get that whipping effect
For the backhand smash you might not need to recover as you know it's going
to be a winning shot! Only joking! But you do need to recover
with a higher stance, ready to pounce on that weaker return!
There are different techniques for taking a really late backhand but we're
sure this video is long enough by now so we won't be covering this in today's
video, but if you do want to learn this technique
let us know in the comments section below! Also we have some very exciting news
last week we launched our online badminton assessment. This is where
you guys send us a video of yourself playing and we'll thoroughly assess your
badminton! Having written and visual feedback and
routines and resources will massively help you improve your
game in areas such as tactics technique movement and footwork
and more! Head to our website using the link here
or we'll include the link in the description below for you to directly go there!
And next week we'll be doing a video on Tai Tzu Ying's famous
backhand reverse drop so make sure you subscribe and turn on your notifications
so you don't miss out on that and thank you to anyone that's still with us if
you've liked this video please give it a like, smash that
subscribe button and we'll see you on another video -
maybe one of the ones we're about to show now!