Backhand shots | Intermediate - General Q&A | Discussion Forum

Matt

If you refer to my article on backhand, look at the first picture of Lee Chong Wei. He has classic hand position.

This hand position ensures the racquet head is square on at impact. If the hand is straighter and you rotate to hit the shuttle, the racquet face will not be square on and result in the shuttle flying out the side of court.

Paul

Dory

Followed the link but I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be looking at as I didn't see anything on backhand.

Paul

OK, I get it.

When I first opened the link I got tons of videos but nothing badminton related for some strange reason.

Tonight I tried it again and got a decent view of what you're talking about.

I have seen this video before and it warrants a bit more explanation to be fair to the coach/player in question. Bearing in mind his credentials, you can't dismiss his style so quickly.

First of all it's a very deceptive style. He kinda leads and drags with his shoulder which actually takes your eye off what the rest of his arm is doing. As he can do this quickly and hit any shot, the speed in the shoulder creates the deception.

This does appear to waste a lot of energy as a technique. However, if you have good hands, as he clearly has, then you can virtually do anything with the shuttle.

For me, if you're going to watch a backhand, learn from the best…Taufik. In my video on backhand clear I use Taufik as the best example. His backhand is effortless, deceptive and extremely powerful. The guy is a genius and it's a shame he has so little top level badminton left. He's been around the pro circuit for such a long time and will be sadly missed when he evenutally decides to retire. I hope we'll see him for a couple more seasons at least, but who knows?

I'm filming straight backhand drop shot tomorrow and perhaps cross court drop shot on Friday although I may switch to footwork or net shots…I've not decided and need to think a lot more about the delivery going forward.

By the way, videos 1 and 2 are complete although I've decided to make a couple of adjustments to each to make things clearer. Video 3 needs editing and I'm filming video 4 tomorrow. Once I've completed video 5 we need to review the software behind the whole system  and make sure everything is working. After that, we'll be ready to launch.

Whilst you're reading this, why not email me and let me know what subjects you'd like me to cover on video. I'm always interested in your views and you never know, I may actually select your suggestion and post a preview of it on my blog.

To your success…ful backhands!

Paul