Top tennis tips

Communicate with your hands

If your partner is serving and you are up at the net and you want to get involved and intercept the return. Put your hand behind your back and show your partner an open hand, this communicates to your partner you would like them to serve down the centre line which usually forces your opponents return to go cross court. Just as they hit their return you go across and cut off the return with a winning volley. This signal also says to your partner that you will automatically swap sides straight after the serve.

So that it is not predictable that whenever you put your hand behind your back you are planning on intercepting using the signal of a closed hand would indicate to your partner that you were going to stay.

Who returns on the ad court?

With out a doubt the more consistent player of the two.
This is because there are six game points to be won or lost on the ad court. 40 - 0, 40 - 30, Ad in, 0 - 40, 30 - 40 and Ad out. On the deuce court there are only two game points 40 - 15 or 15 - 40.
The player who is the more consistent returner will handle the big points with more success, winning or saving the game.

Get a grip and put your volleys away

A lot of club players use a forehand grip to volley with. Sure, you can get power on the forehand, however it is hard to put it away cleanly as the ball tends to bounce up of the surface giving your opponents another bite of the cherry. As well making your backhand volley almost impossible it limits your options and makes your volleys very one-dimensional.

Learn to use the continental grip as you can get a little slice to the volley, which can make it slide and accelerate off the court for winners. This grip change, when mastered can also give you a new repertoire of volleys e.g. drop, lob and acute angle making volleys.