What not to do when playing a game!!

Two days back, I played 5 games with a new guy and discovered new things about myself and my game!! Now this new guy waa a lot younger guy and though I figured out that technically I am a much better player than he is, he could run longer and could retrieve many more balls - both at the front and back of the court. His weak areas were predictable - back court backhand corner and not so accurate shots - especially on the long, mid-power shots in the backhand back court. So I thought I will have it easy till we started playing.

This guy was running for most of the balls and he could reach most of the drops in front court by virtue of having a faster pair of legs. He was also managing to somehow return the balls from the back court, primarily by hitting boasts. Now a couple of these boasts hit the nick and got me really irritated - here I was controlling the entire rally - making that guy run all over the court, scampering to retrieve the ball - and then from a losing position he hits a boast that takes the nick and gives him the point!! And this happened 2-3 times in the first 2 games!! So here I was doing everything right - but not being able to close the points!! Worse I was losing them to someone - who I felt was a worse player than I am!!

So this was getting me really irritated - and that is when I started making mistakes!! Instead of hitting more long, high balls to the backhand backcourt, that obviously was his weakness, I started slamming the ball harder and lower on the front wall trying to kill it - as if forcibly!! This resulted in the ball falling in mid court and provided easy fodder for him. Soon this became a pattern and the match started slipping out of my hands!! This now became a self-perpetuating cycle - me making mistakes, getting irritated, losing the point, making further mistakes, getting more irritated...... and the scoreline reflected this!! I lost the 5 games with the scoreline 9-6, 9-5, 8-10, 1-9, 3-9!!! It took a lot of restraint not to smash my racket at the end of the fourth and the fifth game!!

My takeaways from this experience:
1. Keep your cool during the game - more so when you are losing!! Losing your cool can only make things worse for you!!
2. In the game, if you are getting worked up, try and slow things down - hit slower and deeper shots.
3. Brute force will not work - most of the time. Brute force only makes the ball come back harder!!
4. Play to exploit opponents weaknesses - obvious isn't it? Not so obvious when you are fuming and fretting!!
5. Do not get irritated if things do not go to plan - refer point 2!!

Erratic training schedules

Last month was characterized by erratic training schedules that were primarily aimless and did not improve my skills to the extent they could have. These schedules were primarily spent in working lazily on my footwork with ghosting on the court along with jogging off the court.

Thanks to my consistent jogging schedule off the court, I have realized that I am able to last much longer on the court without feeling as if my lungs are going to burst!! What it is not adding to is my movement and balance on the court!! Hold on...before you all start pulling out the knives and start saying that this contradicts what I had written in my earlier post - I am a lot better than what I was earlier!!

But now I am playing players who are a lot better and faster than I am and playing with them made me realize that my balance and anticipation need a lot of improvement - apart from a lot of other things!!

Some good things now - I have played some of the players that I have been playing with would have normally thrashed me blue!! Now, that is last week, when I played them, I was able o stretch them and make them sweat!!Infact, I made all of them huff and puff - an no I did not win - not those lat gasp victories!! This is not a hollywood movie - this is life!! Those guys play much more regularly than I do, they have been playing longer and are technically much better than I am. For me, to change their attitudes when it came to playing me was a big victory. over the past 2-3 weeks, while now playing me, they do not have the condescending attitude. They now know that I can last the length and give them a run for their money!! Heck - I took all the games to at least 7 to 8 points on all the games that I played with them!!

My next post tomorrow is going to about where I last the points when I played these players much better than me!!