Follow The Bouncing Ball (Pound Crosscourt)

My all time favorite player is Marat Safin. I didn't like all the drama he created on the court (all the broken rackets and the long patches of playing badly). I really liked his playing style. Marat Safin (mah RAHT SA fin) in his early career had great strokes on both sides. His backhand was more reliable but he had a pretty good forehand too. He also had the ability to hit a better and better stroke as the rally went on.

His strategy was super simple. Hit your shots crosscourt. Then, when there is an opportunity, hit down the line. By opportunity, I mean that the ball is high enough over the net to hit a speedy flat ball. No one seemed to be able to stop this strategy. Because Marat hit such strong groundstrokes, people couldn't go down the line on him very easily. When they tried he would run the ball down and go crosscourt....this time to the other side of the court, insuring that his opponent would run way more than him.

Plus knowing in the back of your mind that he was setting you up to hit the winner down the line gave you no comfort. The only way you could disrupt the pattern would be to come to the net. But when would you hit a solid enough shot to do that and how many times do you think you could do it?

Quick explanation of court geometry: crosscourt means hitting the ball diagonal. If you were both right handed players, your forehand would be to his forehand. Down the line is the opposite. You hit your forehand to his backhand.

The net is lower in the middle (3 ft) and the length is longer diagonally (82.5 ft). The net is higher on the sides (3.5 ft) and the length is shorter (78 ft). I had to use that old Pythagorean Theorem (27 squared + 78 Square = 82.5 Squared).

So if you are able to hit harder and lower crosscourt knowing that you have extra room to make a mistake. Hitting close down the line would be difficult to do if you are hitting a lower ball.

So lets see this in action shall we? The examples of the pattern are at 1:04, 3:10. 4:05, 5:23

This pattern is for when you feel like your groundstrokes are strong enough to wear your opponent down. It's one of those strategies that pay more dividends as the match goes on.