TALENT IS NEVER ENOUGH





Having a lot of tennis talent can sometimes be a problem for some players because at the beginning of your tennis career talent goes a long way. At lower levels, talent alone can win matches. It’s only when you get higher up the rankings and play the bigger events that your reliance on talent alone will really hurt you.

I was at a group 1 ITF Junior event last week and the standard of tennis was very high. Certainly, much higher than the level just a few years ago. Techniques and physical conditioning were exceptional. However, there was one area that was almost invisible, strategic intelligence!

 Many of the young players on display last week were the best in the world. Many will be participating in the Grand Slam events this year. I can imagine that in their early years many of these top juniors dominated the junior events in their countries.

And there lies the problem. Most of the players last week are so gifted, tactics were never needed. They won on talent alone!

The problem for many of these players now is that they are now hitting, what to them probably seems like an invisible ceiling. Talent has taken them as far as this and they have nothing to “kick on” with.

Luckily, it’s never too late to educate yourself strategically and become smarter on-court. The rewards are there for the players who begin the process because having the correct and specific strategy for each opponent wins matches, lots of matches. However, those players that continue to play matches void of specific strategies for each opponent will easily be picked apart by smarter opponents in the future.

BECOME A SMARTER PLAYER

Whenever you play a match your opponent asks questions of you. A fastball asks you a question related to its speed and your reply to that question determines whether you can return the ball successfully or not.

Speeds, heights, angles, depths, and spins are all questions that your opponent sends your way. That’s what makes tennis so challenging, tennis is a series of skill complexities coming at you rapidly needing answers.

The important thing is that you look at matches in this way… 

1.  Your opponent is sending questions your way that have to be answered in the correct way

2. You need to create questions of your own and at a high enough level to cause your opponent difficulty in answering them.

Playing on talent alone will only get you so far. It’s essential that you have a sense of what the opponent is trying to do to you and how to reply to those attempts






Comments

  1. ZerbetennisMarch 12, 2020 at 1:33 AM

    No offense but...duh!!
    Strong bodies, conditioned strokes, hungry to attack but no brains, nothing new!

    The experience of losing either makes you or breaks you and those who don't break so easily eventually crack the ceiling and learn to play high level!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Paul DaleMarch 12, 2020 at 2:08 PM

      Duh indeed... actually the point of the article is to highlight a lack of focus on strategic awareness in tennis. Right or wrong? "Nothing new", really?

      Delete

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