We all know that having a strong service game is very important. But what makes a strong service game? What are the key components? And how good is your service game, really?
In this article, I outline five key elements of a strong service game. I give myself a rating for each element and I want you to do the same.
This will help you identify the areas where you can improve your service game.
1. Spin
Let’s start with the most obvious. Generating heavy spin with your serves has lots of benefits. Heavy spin is more challenging to return. Some opponents will miss. Other opponents will get the ball back, but more passively. Very few opponents will be able to return heavy spin serves aggressively. Plus it means you can use a greater range of spin when serving – sometimes heavier, sometimes lighter. The threat that you may serve with heavy spin causes damage in itself. Your opponent may be fearful of your heavy spin and end up returning all serves a little more tentatively.
Tom’s rating … 3 out of 5
My spin levels are ok, but there is definitely room for improvement. Sometimes when I’m competing and feeling a little tense, my spin levels go down. I need to keep my wrist more relaxed and brush the ball with a more fluid motion at all times.
What rating would you give yourself?
2. Placement
Do you always serve to the same position? Or are you skilled at serving into different areas of the table? Ideally you should be able to serve short, half-long and long, all to the forehand side, backhand side and middle of the table. This gives you many options when you serve. Some of these areas will give your opponent a lot of difficulty. For example, your opponent may find it easy to deal with long serves to the backhand, but really struggle with short serves to the forehand. If you serve into different positions you can expose a weakness. Plus it’s much harder for your opponent to settle and find a ‘receive rhythm’ if you are constantly changing your service placement.
Tom’s rating … 4 out 5
I’m pretty good at service placement, particularly with my pendulum serve. I feel confident hitting different target areas and will vary the placement a lot during my games. I’ve knocked a point off my rating, as I sometimes struggle to keep my serves short in competitive matches. If I get a little tight, they will drift long. I need to improve this part of my service game.
What rating would you give yourself?
3. Variation
We have already talked about varying the degree of spin and varying the placement of the service, but what about other variations? Well you can vary the type of spin. To have a strong service game, you should be able to serve backspin, sidespin-backspin, no spin, topspin and sidespin-topspin. All these different spins make it infinitely harder for your opponent to return your serves, especially if you are also varying the degree of spin and the placement. You can also vary your service action. The most popular actions are pendulum, reverse pendulum, hook, tomahawk, backhand, but there are others too. You don’t need to master all of these, but having two or three different service actions will give you more options when you play.
Tom’s rating … 3 out of 5
I was slightly torn for this one. I was tempted to give myself a high rating, as I am able to do lots of spin variations with my pendulum serve. But really I am only confident in doing multiple spin variations with two service actions – pendulum and backhand. I would benefit from mastering a couple more service actions.
What rating would you give yourself?
4. Deception
Can your opponents easily read your serves? Or do you manage to disguise your spin well, leaving your opponent confused and tentative? Having good service deception can make a huge difference at all levels of the game. There are multiple ways of improving deception – using subtle wrist movements, using fake movements, using unusual or distracting actions. This is definitely a higher level skill. To get to the stage when you can really have a lot of deception, you need to be able to do the first three elements well (heavy spin, placement, variation). When these are mastered, adding extra deception to your serves can be deadly.
Tom’s rating … 2 out of 5
This is an area I could improve a lot. I think I have a degree of deception which works at a lower level. But at a higher level opponents can read my serves all too easily. When I try to add deception, I often make a mess of my service. So I need to practice this a lot more. If I can develop my service deception, I would cause opponents all kinds of problems.
What rating would you give yourself?
5. Recovery
And finally, how well do you recover after your serve? Do you serve, stay still and hope your opponent misses? Or do you recover quickly into a neutral position, ready to play the next shot? The recovery is a key element of any serve. At higher levels, serves are returned most of the time. And not only returned, but returned with good quality. So you must be ready for the ball to come back. You should develop this habit, regardless of what level you are playing at. Why is the recovery after the serve so important? Because it helps you get ready to play a 3rd ball attack. You serve, the ball is returned and then you attack the next ball. This puts you in a dominant position to win the point.
Tom’s rating … 4 out of 5
For this, I give myself a decent rating. 3rd ball attack is one of my strengths (at the level I play at). However, there is always room for improvement. Sometimes in competitive matches, I don’t recover quick enough or have the right distance from the table or have enough bounce in my legs. So more work needed!
What rating would you give yourself?
Developing a multifaceted service game
As you can see, having a really strong service game is more than just having a few decent serves. You need strong service spin, excellent placement, lots of variation, clever deception and a really good recovery. If you can get good at all these different aspects, then your service game is going to be really high level and you will cause opponents lots of problems.
It’s useful to do the rating exercise as it shows where your strengths are and where your shortcomings are.
If I add up all the different categories, then I have a rating of 16 out of 25. I think this is fair. My service game is decent, but there is a lot more I can do to improve.
Time for some service practice!
Want more service tips?
If you want more service tips, I recommend you join Tom’s TT Academy. You will also get access to a wide range of exclusive coaching content, including:
- in-depth courses
- training drills
- tactical toolkit
- video analysis
- live sessions
- equipment recommendations
- fitness videos
- robot training videos
- member discussions
- pro match analysis
- skill challenges
- and lots more!
You can access all this content for less than £1 per week. New content is added regularly. Join hundreds of table tennis players around the world today at tomsttacademy.com