Hey everyone, Simon and Alex here with Top Tennis Training,
and in this video we're going to show you how to deal with those heavy topspin shots in tennis
now we all struggle with those deep balls that bounce aggressively so we're going to show you
five ways to deal with them now before we get any deeper into the lesson if you're serious about
improving your game then make sure you have subscribed to the channel but you also turn
on that notification bell so that youtube will let you know whenever we release a new lesson
now dealing with a moon ball is just one of the ways to win a tennis match if you want to find
more ways all you have to do is download our free pdf guide click on the link beneath this
video that will take you to our website enter your email address and we'll send you that free
guide right away now the worst thing you can do when dealing with a high top spin moon ball
is catching it at its highest point where it's above your head and you're unable to do anything
with that ball this often happens when you're too close to the baseline so your positioning
is too close to the baseline and you don't give yourself space by either moving back
or going forward to make sure that you catch the ball in your hitting zone which is between
your hip level and your shoulder level so anything above that now becomes a little bit more difficult
to deal with and the higher it goes the tougher it is to hit the shot into the core now often
when we see that higher moon ball it can travel slower due to the spin that was put on the ball
this can be deceiving as when i watch that ball i want to move to the ball to attack it but what we
forget about is that the ball actually contains a lot of spin it has a little spin put on it
so once it bounces it's going to shoot up at you so if you've positioned yourself too close to the
ball and that happens you're going to end up late on the ball and it will often mishit that ball
the first way to deal with this high ball is to move back and that should be your go-to play if
you're just starting to learn the move you're going to buy yourself a little bit more time
therefore you're going to be able to hit the shot a lot easier you're going to allow the ball to
come up and as you move back you're going to let it come down to be within your hitting zone as we
said the worst thing to do is to hit the ball over your head so we're letting that ball come down and
in the meantime i have enough time to prepare and hit my shot normally now guys make sure you stick
around to the end of the video where we'll reveal two drills which you should be doing with your
coach or your training partner so here recognizing that the ball might be going a little bit deeper
and even if it's looking like it's a little bit slower i'm still going to buy myself some time
by quickly turning so i'm making my uneven split step i'm going to turn and i will either side step
i may even use a crossover step to give myself even more time now from here if the ball is coming
down i can now use my back leg to either do a hop or turn a jump step either one of them will work
but at least i've given myself the time to let the ball come down and hit the shot
now if i've gone too far and i realized that the ball is now a little bit easier i can always make
up space and go forward it's a lot easier to move forward to the ball rather than hit the shot while
moving back so if i've made the space and then i have to move into it and hit it properly that's
okay so don't feel like just because you've moved back you now have to stay there you're
always looking and always adjusting you want to be as light and as sharp with your feet as possible
so to make sure that just because the ball is a little bit higher and slower you don't start
moving slow with your feet that's the time to get even more explosive now when you move back
you have to accept you have to play a defensive shot this is because you're now further behind the
baseline you don't have as much angle available to you you're further away from your opponent
therefore the ball is going to take longer to reach them and because you have to cover a lot
more distance with your shot you now have to give more height to the ball and going cross-court is a
good idea if you go cross-court you don't have to recover quite as much and you can actually cover
most of the court if you go down a line you risk being attacked across court what you're looking
for is to hit that moon ball back and see if you can put the play back on them and see if they
can deal with that shot so make sure you're going for that nice height you're going for
depth and you're mostly going cross-court or down the middle at least so that your opponent
can't attack you and expose the angles on the court now the second option you have in dealing
with these high topspin shots is to move forward and take it on the rise before it gets too high
so the ball is going to bounce it's going to bounce and go through my contact zone twice on
the way up and then on the falling ball so that's exactly what we've covered in method one now this
is a more advanced method you're stepping in so you're taking time away from yourself but you're
also taking time away from your opponent now in order for you to execute this on the rise tactic
well you'll have to stay low so lower your center of gravity you'll have to be quick at getting to
that ball because if you move to that ball late the ball will end up again above your shoulder
out of that strike zone so i want to stay low i want to shorten my swing slightly because now i
have less time so i'm taking time away from myself so that shorter swing will help me to make contact
out in front on both my forehand or my back and side now a lot of players they think that when
they take the ball on the rise they have to hit the ball flatter and harder which is not true you
can still hit with good levels of topspin but by taking the ball early you're already taking time
away from your opponent now you can also go cross-court with these shots that will be the
higher percentage play if you do go down the line make sure you've hit a really good shot and you've
pushed the player way off the court because if you hit a down the line shot that isn't very good
the player can exploit the space on the other side now on some surfaces like clay it will be very
hard for you to take the ball on the rise because of the bad bounces if you still want to try this
just make sure you stay light on your feet on the balls of the feet ready to adjust for any
bad bounces now remember if you choose this option and you step in to no man's land and you take that
ball on the rise don't stay there you either have to transition into the net after your shot or you
have to move back behind the baseline so that you don't get caught out with those deep shots
on the next one now in a perfect world we'll hit our shot between the hip and the shoulder
level but sometimes that ball still goes up especially on slightly bouncier courts like clay
so if you've been caught out where the ball has risen high you have to be able to deal with it and
there are two ways that we can do that either with a flat shot or a slice shot the slice is a great
way of dealing with that high ball because you don't have to get above the ball to close it off
in order to hit the shot and it stays low and makes it difficult for the opponent to attack
now when it gets high on that backhand to hit an effective slice make sure that you've got
your elbow up you've got your left hand holding the racket so you're starting nice and high so
you can go down on the ball and through the shot and into the court what you don't want to do is
to a lean back on the ball by letting the ball come down onto your racket because most likely
you're going to hit a floating slice which the opponent can attack but also you don't want to
cut down and chop on the ball because yes the ball will have a lot of slice but you won't have enough
depth or the ball will not get carried onto the other side of the court now this can happen a lot
for example on a second serve return if you've been caught out by a high kick you'll need to
slice that ball and it's something that someone like roger federer does great he slices that ball
cross-court it's a great way to go cross-court chip and then recover back which now puts you
in a good position so make sure that your body weight is going forward through contact we don't
want to lean back we're putting our shoulder down into the court we're transferring our body weight
from our back foot to our front foot and we're carrying on through the shot remember you're
not cutting down you're going down but through sometimes when the ball is a little bit shorter
and it's loopier we can also play a drop shot so some players end up playing drop shots from these
kind of shots because they're moving forward and they're able to control the ball with the slice
but again that's more of an advanced move make sure that you master the slice first
what you're aiming for is a low trajectory going low over the net
so that the ball can bite on the other side and stay low and difficult for the
opponent to attack after the shot we can either transition forward and use it as an approach shot
or we recover back behind the baseline ready for our next shot now when you're
moving forward the transition shot a great way to hit it would be to go down a line
because you then close off the angles when you're coming forward and when you go cross-court make
sure that you recover back slightly to the left of the line and be ready to chase the next shot
now another option on these higher bouncing balls is to allow the ball to rise to around shoulder
level and then hit a much flatter more aggressive shot this is once again a more advanced option but
if you are someone who wants to start being more aggressive then start working on this tactic right
away
now with this method you have to make sure that you get the ball around shoulder level if you let
it go too high once again it'll become more of a defensive shot so on the forehand side i can use
the open or the semi-open stance but then drive on to my left leg so we'll go from this loaded
position onto my left leg this will ensure that my body weight goes into that ball now with the
backhand the two-handed or the one-handed backhand it's an easier option to step in with that neutral
or that semi-closed stance because now you can transition your body weight through that
contact point now on that backhand side you can still use a jump step as you're hitting so i
can go neutral stance and then have a hop step right to right if you're a right-handed player
some players that use this would be saffron nalbanion marcelo rios and for the one-handers
we still have some players who like to drive into that single-handed backhand
now in order to generate more power on these high balls it's really important that we uncoil
through that contact point so as i'm going to that shot i'm making sure that i turn the shoulders
on both sides but instead of just hitting and staying front on i actually want my back shoulder
to come all the way around until it's facing the net that will ensure that i get that massive coil
and uncoil twist all the way through the contact point now remember with this option because you
are hitting the ball quite high you're hitting it around shoulder level you don't need a massive
lift on that ball you don't need to produce that massive net margin you can hit the ball
much flatter but it's important that you don't go for the lines because then it'll become too risky
so we're going for large targets cross score or down the line make sure you give yourself a good
amount of margin on either side so the length or the depth so you don't hit the ball long or wide
now the most aggressive and attacking option that we have is hitting a drive volley
now because the moon ball that spinny shot takes time to reach the baseline
it's a little bit slower it flies through there a little bit slower therefore if you're quick
enough to recognize that it's going to be a deep moon ball even if it's got spin on it it still
will take time to reach the baseline if you can get inside the core get your body moving forward
and take the ball out of the air you'll actually not only rush your opponent
but you can actually open up a lot more angle on the court and that's why a lot of the players
especially the wta players they get inside the court because they hit the ball quite flat
they're unlikely to find angle from behind the court but once they get forward and then
hit that drive volley all of a sudden you can open up the angles and you can become even more
aggressive and the technique is very similar for the flat shot where you're loading your legs and
you're jumping into the shot in order to hit it now often when we're looking for that drive volume
we got into the court the ball can be a little bit too high to hit that dry volley so even a smash
becomes an option if you can get underneath that ball and smash that ball down it's an even
more aggressive option but again it's a little bit risky you need to make sure that you get
underneath that ball and make sure that you can get your arm up and a nice contact above your body
so here's the drill now we're going to work on moving back for that moon ball and creating space
this drill is called the v drill where you hit the shot you come back forward and then you move
back again so we'll have a cone in the middle of the court which i have to go around and this
is to recreate you for example landing after a serve where you end up inside the court and
then you get forced back by a deep return where you have to a have the right full work pattern
to get back for that shot but also hit the shot properly so have the right footwork during contact
here i'm aiming for high deep balls to recreate the shot that i'll be trying to hit and after the
shot i'm going to move forward again and this is obviously if you've hit a deep ball you're then
looking for that shorter one you never want to be surprised by the shorter one after your good shot
so it's back forward then back then forward and it's that v pattern that we're going to recreate
now you've worked on moving back and creating space the next drill is all about taking the
ball on the rise and staying inside the baseline so alex is going to be feeding me quite deep balls
with a lot of spin and i'm not allowed to step in the green so i'm going to have a
few cones behind me which almost block me from going back here the focus is on staying low so
low center of gravity shortening my swings on both sides so that i can find that contact point
and making sure that i still have some margin on those shots so i'm not trying to blast the shot
as hard as possible i can still control that shot but i'm taking it on the rise
thank you so much for watching the video we hope you've enjoyed it and
learned something new now if you have make sure you smash that like button
make sure you share the video with anyone that you think will benefit from learning from this
and also leave a comment under the video and let us know what you struggle with most in your game
don't forget to subscribe to the channel as well and turn on the notification bell signing off
simon and alex see you soon guys so now it's time for the drill first let's work on our recovery and
now it's time for the drill first we'll work on the moving bag for those peoples so this is
so now it's time for the drill this drill is called the v-drill digital drill drill
drill so now it's time for the drill here we're going to work on getting back for those depots
and then recovery after the shot back to those defaults yes so now it's time for the drill
you