When I started out in 1976, the consensus among coaches that I worked with was that you didn’t have time to grip change between forehand and backhand. And so I learned to use one grip for both. I ended up with a more forehand grip and developed a strong forehand. The victim was my backhand, where I became steady but never developed a strong attack. As one of my fellow coaches said after I explained this to him, and he tried hitting with the same grip, “I can’t even hit a decent backhand with my forehand grip.”

Since I’ve recently started a comeback as a player competing in senior events, I’ve been working a lot on my backhand. This grip issue was a big issue. So, how did I address it? The exact same way you should.

First, I went to the table and worked out the perfect grip for my forehand. This took about two seconds since I already had that grip. You should do this as well – find the perfect grip for your forehand.

Second, I went to the table and worked out the perfect grip for my backhand. This took a little longer, and involved putting a little more pressure on the racket with my thumb, and a small rotation of the top of the racket away from me. But once I had it, my backhand was much better in drills. You should do this as well – find the perfect grip for your backhand.

Third, I spent a bunch of time practicing the grip change. I could literally do this while watching TV or while walking about coaching a group session. Just fiddle it back and forth until it feels natural.

Fourth, I spent a lot of time at home with a racket, shadow-practicing moving side to side, alternately hitting forehands and backhands, where I changed grips back and forth until the grip change became automatic when I moved to play backhand.

Fifth, I did live drills where I had to alternate between forehand and backhand shots, thereby incorporating the grip change.

Sixth, I did live drills where I had random shots between forehand and backhand, so that I could incorporate the grip change as part of the recognition of whether I would be playing forehand or backhand. By the time I got to this stage it was surprisingly automatic.

Seventh, I played matches with the new grip changes.

And guess what? My backhand is much better – mostly. When I played a tournament against unfamiliar players, I found myself a bit uncomfortable attacking with the backhand, especially early in matches. It got better as the matches went on and I adjusted to the different opponents, but this part still needs work. And so I’ll add:

Eighth, play lots of matches against unfamiliar player with the new grip changes, especially in tournaments.

The sequence above is actually similar to how you’d incorporate any change or new technique into your game – so even if this doesn’t apply directly to you, it should give you a good idea of how to work the techniques you need work on. Go to it!

You know the ball has heavy backspin. You know you have to either open your racket, hit upward, or both. And yet, players still often attack heavy backspin balls into the net far more often than off the end. In theory, since you are compensating for the heavy backspin, you should go off the end just as often as into the net. Ideally, of course, you’d return it on the table – but you’d do that a lot more if you weren’t going into the net so much. It means that you need to increase your average net clearance (relying on topspin to pull the ball down) – and end up with fewer in the net and more off the end – but overall, more on the table. With more net clearance, your balls will also go deeper on the table, which are more effective than topspins that land shorter, which are easier to counter-attack. (To get this higher net clearance on topspin shots, some find it easier to simply aim deeper on the table, which gets the same effect since you have to arc the ball more to do so.)

If you often attack heavy backspin balls into the net, perhaps video a match where you do this. See what percentage of your misses are into the net and what percentage off the end – as well as what percentage hit the table. Then work on decreasing the into-net percentage while increasing – yes, increasing – the off-the-end shots because of your higher net clearance and increased depth. By doing so, you’ll likely end up with far more balls on the table and a better feel for what you need to do to attack those backspin balls with the right clearance and arc so they consistently hit the table.

If you make a habit of closely watching opponents to pick up on little cues that let you know where their next shot will go, your subconscious will get the message and start reacting to it. The subconscious learns by repetition - but only if you actually observe the opponent so that your conscious and subconscious minds can pick up on them.

An example of this would be trying to judge the direction an opponent hits his forehand. You could just wait and see what direction his racket is going at or just after contact. That’s what beginners have to do – there’s a reason they react so slowly to shots. But more advanced players subconsciously react to the shot well before contact. At the intermediate level, they likely react soon after the opponent starts his forward swing, as at that point you can usually judge where the ball is going to go, basically by seeing the line between the racket and ball and extending it to your side. This works . . . at the intermediate level.

At higher levels, players adjust even sooner to the opponent’s shot. They may react right as that forward swing starts, or even before that. You can usually tell where an opponent’s forehand is going from his shoulder rotation, and from that, see where they are going even before they start their forward swing. That’s why top players sometimes seem to have supernatural reflexes – but it’s not quick reflexes, it’s early recognition of the direction of the shot.

So, start watching opponents for little clues like that – everyone has them, but they are often different. When you see them, you won’t be able to consciously react to them, but the subconscious will – and soon you’ll be reacting like a pro.

One cautionary note – at higher levels, players often disguise or change their direction as they forward swing – such as an inside-out forehand – and so you have to adjust to each player based on this, sometimes waiting until nearly at contact before you know for sure where they are going. As a match goes on, you should react more and more quickly to the opponent’s shots as your subconscious picks up on when they can react against each opponent and each of their shots. Once you do this, you’ll become like a backboard, reacting to anything the opponent does.

And all you have to do is observe the opponent while the subconscious does the work, and you get the credit!

There are many aspects of a good serve, but one of them – which I’ve written about before – is the importance of serving low. This puts tremendous pressure on the opponent, especially if he wants to attack your serve. Even on passive returns he’s forced to lift the ball a bit, which causes a loss of control and a greater likelihood of popping the ball up.

But how do you know if you are serving low? One way is how often you serve net serves. (Technically, they are let serves, but for this article I’m going to call them net serves.) Some players likely pride themselves on “clean” serves that never nick the net, but I’d advice the opposite. If you really are serving low, then you will get a higher number of serves that nick the net. You are unlikely to actually serve into the net too often, assuming you are practicing your serves, but if you want to serve really low, the ball’s going to brush the net sometimes. Make it a badge of honor!

Here’s a serving drill. Get a box of balls and practice serving low, short, spinny serves. When you feel comfortable with the serve, try serving so the ball does nick the net. You are used to serving with enough net clearance to cleanly go over the net, but perhaps you are giving it too much clearance, leading to a higher serve, which makes things easier for your opponent. See just how low you can serve and get it over the net – and the best way to do this is to actually try to serve as low as possible while still going over the net - and that’s a serve that just nicks the net. Do twenty serves and see how many net serves you can do without actually serving into the net!

Some players try to work on the strokes by trying to learn the stroke, contact, timing, footwork, positioning, and reading of spin . . . all at the same time. That’s like trying to teach the alphabet to a kindergartner by asking him to write essays.

One thing at a time!

You’d teach the kindergartner the alphabet, then the proper spelling of simple words, then simple sentence structures, and so on, until they are ready to write an essay, such as the one I’m writing now. Somehow I got out of kindergarten.

Similarly, in table tennis, you want to break it down in parts, even at the advanced levels. Sure, you could learn to, say, backhand flip serves by just doing so in games against various serves. And you would learn it that way. But you’d learn it at a higher level if, instead, you first learned the proper technique against a short, simple backspin serve first, then once that’s mastered, learn to do it against, heavy backspin, then no-spin, then sidespins, then side-topspin, and any other spin combinations, and then you’d learn to do it against varied spins where you don’t know what’s coming. By taking it in steps, you’d learn each step much better than if you tried to learn them all at the same time.

Make a list of the various table tennis techniques you’d like to learn. Break them down into each part of the technique. Then focus on learning each of those parts before putting them all together.

To give an example, I’ve recently made a comeback as a player, with some success. One of the big issues I’ve faced is my backhand is relatively weak and passive. So, I’ve been working on making it more aggressive. How? First, I’ve simply hit backhand-to-backhand with my practice partner, playing it as aggressively as I could while still being consistent. A key issue is that I often held my racket too far in front in my ready position and so was too slow in bringing the racket back for backhands – and so I ended up with weak, rushed backhands. So, I’ve isolated that one aspect and worked on it. I also found I sometimes step with just one foot for some backhands instead of moving with both feet, as I do with the forehand. I also had a grip problem – and so I worked on that by itself. When I feel comfortable with my new techniques, then I’ll do more random drills where I have to adjust to different incoming balls, including being ready for both forehand and backhand. If I’d jumped to that from the start, I wouldn’t be able to perfect as much as possible the various parts of the technique that can lead to a much higher level in the end.

So, break down each technique to its basic parts and learn each, and that way the techniques won’t break down on you!