In my opinion most essential part of developing a player is giving him/her best possible looking technique. To develop great strokes has to start as soon as player decides to treat tennis more as a sport than a hobby. Between ages 8-12 is a time frame when chances to the stroke can be made. Installing great fundamental, and showing kids the right way to hit the ball is essential in early development of player. You can’t start teaching a player one way and then tell him when he/she gets older actually this is the way you should hit the ball. This method of teaching is not fair towards player. Teach players to hit the ball the right way as soon as you can.

As a player gets in their teens changes to strokes become increasingly more difficult to make. If we as coaches give kids a chance to hit the ball with the correct technique, we might be able to find out how talented some players really are. A great deal of time I have come across a good athlete that moves well and he/ she is physically strong but strokes are just not good enough to hold up on the higher level of tennis. It is a shame if a player was thought the right technique they might have had a chance to really push on with their tennis career. Too many times when a player with deficiencies in strokes comes to take a lesson from me they tell me. “ I hit the ball great but really need help with my strategy”.

When is come to strategy there is only two options where you can hit the ball in tennis. First option is you can hit the ball crosscourt the other option is you can hit the ball down the line. You do not need to be a tennis expert and realize that hitting the ball crosscourt is safer. The net is lower plus the court is longer. The court is 82.5 feet in length when hitting crosscourt and 78 feet in length when hitting a shot down the line. Let pose this question “ What kind of strategy is there against someone who hits the serve 140 mph “? Is the player returning serve thinking I will hit the return down the line? I think the only thought that goes to player mind when returning 140 mph serve is please don’t hit me with your serve, and I will do anything in my power just to get this serve in play. There is a lot of talk about pattern play out there. If a player can execute certain pattern play during the match that means he probably hits the ball a lot cleaner and harder than his opponent.

What strategy is there against Federer’s forehand? Keep it away from the forehand side. This is not strategy it is common sense. The only strategy during the match a player should find his opponent weaker side and hit to that side, at best he should make his opponent run and hit the weaker side. Another strategy that I know is if your opponent hit 8 shots inside the court you should try hit 9 shots inside the court. At the end of the day a player with less unforced errors wins the match. Again this is common sense not expertise. Why do we try and complicate things as coaches? Strokes will take care of strategy. If your strokes are technically sound they should hold up under pressure you will probably be pretty successful tennis player. Tennis at the end is all about hitting your targets under stress or pressure. If you can do this consistently you will find yourself very difficult to beat. Players often come to me and tell me I lost my match 6-0 6-1, but the guy that I played was not very good. My response is: what do you mean? I lost to a guy who doesn’t do anything with the ball he just gets it in play. Well that sounds like a pretty good player to me. Here is a question that you can ask yourself if you want to play pro tennis. Are my strokes good enough and do I hit the ball big enough to compete on the highest level? Talent of a player has a great deal of how hard certain individual hits the ball. For example if all things being equal a player with technically more sound game will always win the match.

Let's make something clear technique is not everything but definitely makes it a lot easier to compete and win matches. Too many coaches out there have made a whole industry in teaching strategy and developing patterns play during matches. In the end, like I said you can only miss crosscourt or down the line, and if you miss, it is probably because your technique broke down.