How do you return serve?

[Roy125]

With a fast serve to my body, I usually redirect the pace to the center of the court (or to the corners if I'm lucky).

With a serve that is quickly going away from me, I lob it so that I get back in position.

For serves that I have no time to prepare for, I try to poke it back.

For slow and bouncy serves, I take a full cut at the ball.

[Fuji]

Originally Posted by Cindysphinx

Lob by getting under the serve and popping it up?

The hell, you say!!

Nope, not gonna do it. Too ugly. Style points matter. If I can't get some topspin and make the lob offensive, I'd rather not lob at all.

LOL! Cindy, I think this post made you officially graduate to 4.0!

Trust me, this is one of the ugliest returns I've ever seen. I watched a 4.0 male serve to a 3.5 male, and he got under the ball, with a slice type motion, but instead of driving it, he "flicked" up and 30 feet in the air it went with back spin. Truly horrendous.

-Fuji

[Devilito]

Rec players often have terrible return of serves because they don’t practice it outside of matches. Even tournament players get into the same rut of baseline rallies and 11s and totally neglect their serve and return which is probably the top 2 most important shots in tennis.

[baek57]

Depends on the serve. But generally speaking anything to my backhand will be coming back as a slice and anything to my forehand will be coming back with topspin. The pace of the serve will dictate how much of a cut I take at the ball (slower serve = bigger cut).

[HEADfamilydynasty]

i almost always take a full cut. i only do otherwise when i didn't anticipate the serve properly.

[Cindysphinx]

Originally Posted by Fuji

LOL! Cindy, I think this post made you officially graduate to 4.0!

Trust me, this is one of the ugliest returns I've ever seen. I watched a 4.0 male serve to a 3.5 male, and he got under the ball, with a slice type motion, but instead of driving it, he "flicked" up and 30 feet in the air it went with back spin. Truly horrendous.

-Fuji

I can't graduate just yet.

I remembered I have a friend who practices singles with me. She loves to S&V. At first, I used to try to pass her. She comes to net like a freight train, so this didn't work often enough. What did work was, um . . . getting under the serve and popping it up. Because of her excessive forward momentum, any decent lob would win the point.

Oh, the shame . . . .

[Fuji]

Originally Posted by Cindysphinx

I can't graduate just yet.

I remembered I have a friend who practices singles with me. She loves to S&V. At first, I used to try to pass her. She comes to net like a freight train, so this didn't work often enough. What did work was, um . . . getting under the serve and popping it up. Because of her excessive forward momentum, any decent lob would win the point.

Oh, the shame . . . .

Oh Cindy, the shame!!!

Soon enough, you shall become a legitimate 4.0, and all of TT will rejoice! Then, the hunt for 4.5 begins....

-Fuji

[NLBwell]

Hmm, the percentages of the answers are adding up to 135%

[Bud]

Originally Posted by NLBwell

Hmm, the percentages of the answers are adding up to 135%

You can select more than once answer

[Laver777]

depends on the serve. but generally i try and take a full cut and back myself. but i allways try and mix it up to keep the opponet guessing. add in a chip n charge sometimes too.

[NLBwell]

Originally Posted by Bud

You can select more than once answer

Oh!
I'm limiting myself unnecessarily.

[Freshest_Cereal]

Originally Posted by Headshotterer

my choice isnt here.

shorten swing and hit a solid return

Originally Posted by Fuji

I'm pretty sure that's "Block it Back" under the options. I did forget to add your option though! Anyone know how to edit the poll options?

-Fuji

For your poll, perhaps that's what you meant by "redirecting?" Because I'm pretty sure the above poster is not blocking it back. Blocking (to me, and perhaps I am quite wrong on my tennis terminology) implies that you're not swinging, which would be more similar to a volley.

In my experience (and I'm relatively young), my current coach and the ones before him all seem to be on par regarding the shortened back-swing return methodology. The above post seems to be of similar style:

It's not that the swing is small, but merely the strategy of not taking the racket [racquet] back all the way. A complete follow-through is a MUST to get enough topspin to keep in the court, in most cases anyway. With a slightly shortened back-swing, what I'm gaining is not hitting my returns too deep (aka out)...

More importantly, it counteracts my ADD so that I'm not getting to the ball too late (seriously! Oh, look, a squirrel... ). Pathetic, but it works, because my return game has skyrocketed with this minor adjustment.

Now, neither pace nor spacing out cannot deter my returns! If I'm doing everything else right, anyway...

It also works with slower serves, spin of various sorts, and the junk that I get from friends who cannot serve, because I don't get out-of-control when I see a "lay-up" presented to me in the service box.

[5263]

Originally Posted by BurnNotice

Why anyone would dink back a dink serve is beyond me.

While I'm not much of a dinker at all on rtns, I can see why players building confidence in their games would choose this. IMO one of the most important things I can do when the the other guy is serving, is to make him work hard if he is going to hold. The harder I work him, the less chance his good serve will determine those points and the better chance to break him, along with breaking his confidence. I'm fortunate that rtn is one of the better parts of my game, so I can be quite aggressive and stay very consistent as well. When returning I want to make sure I get some rally shots going for keeping a rhythm on strokes for when he is serving, because I don't expect to hit as many strokes when I'm serving. When I'm serving, I will keep the points shorter and push my advantage, but when returning, IMO you should extend rallys and not let him push the advantage of his serve.

[Caesar]

Pretty much always short backswing and solid return. Throw in the occasional skidding slice BH to keep them on their toes.

I can't imagine taking a full cut at a serve that's anything less than a complete dolly. For a serve with any sort of pace it's unnecessary and just takes time away from yourself. Basically, it lowers the percentage of the shot for negligible additional benefit. There's a reason why none of the great returners (Agassi, Djokovic, etc.) are known for a big backswing on their returns.

If I have enough time to take a full cut at the ball and still hit it reliably, that's telling me that I'm standing too far back. I'd rather stand closer, have better angles and take more time away from my opponent.

[USERNAME]

Depends... BIG serve with great varied placement, Ill just try to get it back.
BIG serve with consistent placement, Ill redirect it.
Midpace serve with great placement, Ill redirect at first but if I find a tell in the toss or motion or something Ill take a cut.
Midpace with consistent/no placement WATCH OUT! Im bangin the return.

[TennisCJC]

Hard serves: redirect with compact motion with either a small amount of slice or top. Very little backswing, but still follow-thru. Follow-thru doesn't wrap around as much as racket speed is slower.

Slower serves: more topspin and more aggressive cut. Full follow-thru with full wrap. Also, may hit underspin or topspin approach shot if serve is short and slow.

Encourage everyone to attack slow serves. This is basically like a short ball in a rally and should be treated as such. Go for it.

[LuckyR]

I play a lot of doubles and usually in the ad court. I never lob intentionally though my chips on very good serves can end up an deep defensive lobs in practice. I will take a full cut on the FH wing (and I try to run abound my BH on returns) if possible. I will chip BHs, either very CC or in my alley as I face a lot of aggressive poachers. Same with the FH off of very good serves or against S&Vers (which is a lot of my competition).

Full cuts usually end up as easy to volley returns in doubles, chips end up as scooping, difficult volleys against S&Vers.

[UWBTennis]

I like to redirect slow first serves (<60 mph serves) by taking a short backswing and keeping the ball in front and pointing my racket where I want it to go. On faster serve I just poke it back as a deep slice. On any second serve less than 50 mph I'll take a full swing to put on the pressure. One thing I do try to do though is never be more than a feet off the baseline when I return the serve. I'm rarely outside the baseline when I return a second serve and am always either on the baseline or inside the baseline (depends on serve speed) when I return the first serve.

[okaythen]

this video said always go diagonal toward the serve and never run parallel to the baseline...is it true for most serves? any exceptions? thanks

[ShoeShiner]

Lob return can be used in double.