These five tips won’t generally help you win, at least not directly. They won’t score points for you. But they will make certain non-playing aspects more efficient and more fun – and indirectly, may subconsciously intimidate an opponent when faced with these displays of “professionalism”!

1. Picking up ball with feet. If the ball hits the ground, the point is over, and someone has to pick it up. But if it’s bouncing more than a few inches, why lean down when, with a tap of your foot, you can bounce it up in the air and catch it? You’ve probably seen players do this. How do you learn to do it? By practicing! Drop a ball on the floor, wait until it’s bouncing somewhat low, and then tap it with the balls of your foot. With a little practice, you’ll be able to control it so it bounces right into your hands. Bonus – if the ball is lying on the floor stationary, you can also pick it up by putting both feet on each side, and lightly jumping. This lifts the ball up enough so that you can then tap it with your foot and into your hands.
2. Returning balls to other courts with backspin. Nothing screams “Amateur!” more than picking up a loose ball from another court and wildly smacking it back at them. “Pros” do it professionally – they backspin it with a simple chopping motion, as if serving forehand backspin. This makes the ball float relatively slowly and on a line right at the person you are hitting the ball to. The backspin also makes it travel much farther so you can return the ball even to someone way off in the distance, and they can catch it easily. How do you learn to do this? Practice a few times, and it becomes easy!
3. Measuring net with your racket. Is the net six inches? You could bring a net measurer or some other measuring device. (Dollar bills are exactly six inches.) But there’s a simpler way – the sponge on most rackets, from tip to handle, is usually exactly six inches. Measure yours to be sure. Then, at the start of any match, just hold the racket next to the next, tip down, and see if it’s the right height. If not, adjust it.
4. Backspin to hide the ball. Most matches start with one of the players hiding the ball under the table in one hand, with the opponent trying to choose which hand the ball is in. But why not do this with flair? If you are hiding the ball, put the ball on the table, put your index finger on the top near side of the ball, and press down, spinning the ball away from you with backspin. With a little practice, you can make it so the spurts out, then returns because of the backspin. Let it pass the endline, catch it in both hands, and then spread your hands under table with the ball in one hand. An impressive way to start a match!
5. Dress like a pro. If you dress like one, your opponent will subconsciously think more highly of you, and that might subconsciously intimidate him. Better still, if you dress like a pro, you’ll subconsciously feel like a pro, and so are more likely to play like one!

Every opponent has a weakness relative to their level. Even Ma Long, often considered the greatest of all time, was “weak” to his wide forehand – but only relative to the rest of his game. I’ve written many tips about how to find and go after these weaknesses.

But one common issue that comes up is when a player says, “But this tactic will only work against this one player, so using it won’t really help my game.” But that’s missing the point. I once played a guy with a tremendous backhand, and he obliterated me in backhand rallies. I finally just served fast down the line to his forehand every time I served, and amazingly, he couldn’t do anything with it – and it set me up every time while taking his backhand out of play. I don’t think I’ve ever played a competitive match against anyone else where this specific tactic would have worked – but that’s not the point. I may never use that specific tactic again – but the habit of finding the weak shots and spots to go after works against everybody. And it was that habit that led me to serving fast down the line over and Over and OVER, and turned a difficult match into an easy win. (And note that you usually don’t want to overuse a successful tactic – variation is key.)

It won’t usually be something as unusual as serving deep to a person’s forehand over and over. But once it becomes a habit to look for every opponent’s weak shots and spots, it becomes easy to find. I played a guy who had no trouble with my usually very effective serves – until I discovered he couldn’t do anything effective against a simple short, low no-spin serve. Another difficult match became an easy win. Another player drilled me in rallies – until I discovered how weak he was against a big breaking serve to his wide backhand. Others had trouble with specific ball placements or shots. I beat one very strong player by attacking the middle and following it up with a shot to the extreme wide backhand. She covered the middle well but didn’t get back into position quickly enough for the wide backhand shot. Another lost against quick pushes to the wide backhand. Another fell apart when I started slow looping. Another telegraphed his usually effective long serves so I was ready for them when he tried to “surprise” me. And so on. Make a habit of finding them, and you’ll find them. And that habit will work against everybody.

It’s not enough to move to the general vicinity of the ball. Table tennis is a game of precision, and almost moving into position is the same as almost making the shot. Instead, focus on that last couple of inches. Don’t lean and make a slightly off-balanced or awkward shot. Those last few inches of movement, often made as a last-second adjustment after getting close to where you should be, can be the difference between a high-precision and oiled machine . . . and a slightly rusty jalopy stroke that never seems quite perfect, though you’re never really sure why.

You can do this last second positioning either by stepping with either foot, or shuffling. The key is to expect to do it, not wait until you realize you have to, and then belatedly try to get into better position – and almost always ending up leaning and making a slightly off-balanced or awkward shot. Expect to make that last-second move, and it’ll become a habit.

A common problem for players at all levels is being too backhand oriented. Backhand orientation (BO for short) means that you favor your backhand too much over your forehand and try to cover too much of the table with the backhand.

Some players are better on the backhand, and so should cover at least half the table with their backhands. But since the forehand is generally more powerful and easier to end the point with, except perhaps in fast rallies, you generally want to cover half or more of the table with the forehand. But many players cover more of the table with their backhand as a way to cover for not developing their forehand - and that's Bad BO.

Bad BO is a disease. It infiltrates your game, multiplies and divides, and takes over your entire playing style. Left untreated, you may find yourself blocking lobs with your backhand. But treated properly, there is hope.

Bad BO is highly contagious and can be caught simply by watching or copying (consciously or subconsciously) someone else in the throes of Bad BO. It generally strikes during the formative years, so you must take precautions against this occurring. Once caught, it takes a lot of practice to undo.

Let's examine the causes of Bad BO. We'll start with foot placement, as that's the root cause of the problem. A player with Bad BO tends to play with his playing foot (the right one for a righty) a bit in front. This makes backhands easy, but to play a forehand from this position you have to twist like a pretzel. It also puts you in a trap whereby you find backhands easier since you are in a backhand position, and are used to this, and will likely lose if you try playing more forehands. But that's only because you haven't given the forehand a chance. Giving the forehand an opportunity to develop may mean a few temporary embarrassments, but in the long run, it's the right thing to do.

So, try playing with your feet parallel to the table, or even with the playing foot slightly back, especially when playing forehands. (Ideally, play backhands with feet parallel, forehands with playing foot slightly back. If you train a lot, you can even learn to play forehands with feet parallel, which gives you a quicker stroke that allows you to stay at the table, but it does take physical training to be limber enough to do this.) With a better proper stance, and a lot of forehand practice, you can get rid of Bad BO.

Don't take the easy way out; stick with the new foot positioning. Your uncomfortableness will pass, you'll lose that Bad BO, and you'll be a better player because of the change. And you won't need a shower or deodorant!

It never ceases to amaze me at how many players push serves back safely, essentially patting it back, perhaps with good backspin, and then mentally pat themselves on the back for making this excellent return. And this works . . . at lower levels.

But why put good backspin on the ball when you can put great backspin on the ball? Guess which is harder to handle?

It's all a matter of wrist snap and grazing. And it's one of the easiest things to practice. Just find a practice partner and practice pushing where you focus on vigorously rotating the wrist into the ball as you graze it, which maximizes the backspin on the ball. The goal isn't good backspin, or even great backspin, but maximal backspin. (There are perhaps two exceptions to this. One is if you fake heavy spin and give lighter spin, to force a mistake. The other is against a player who habitually lifts against backspin with a very consistent, spinny loop, but often lifts off the end if there's less spin.)