Well now. Interesting question… when to play it, and why isn’t it played at a professional level very often?

There are some occasions where the cross net shot is the only valid choice e.g. shuttle is very low and close to the net, but lets leave those alone for now.

The cross court net shot is good for some things and bad for others. If played fast (because it was taken early) and travels almost parallel to the net then its basically a winner. No real disadvantages. However, this should not occur very often at a high level – taking the shuttle that early means that the shuttle was probably played slow and tight to the net – something that doesn’t happen often. If you were that close to the net in order to take the shuttle that early, then at a slightly higher level you should have played a net kill.

At a professional level, they don’t piss about with cross court net shots – they are looking for any opportunity to kill the shuttle and control the forecourt – hitting cross court net shots CAN work, but the best frontcourt players use them very sparingly and its almost always a winner because they have waited for the opponent to be out of position first. For the purpose of control, you want shuttles to come back to you (so you can continue to boss the rally) – hitting a cross court net shot moves the shuttle away from you – the opposite of controlling the net.

So given that when taken REALLY early its a very good shot (as would most other net shots have been), what about when its not taken so early? Against most opponents, they won’t be able to change direction and retrieve the shot – so thats good. But if you do pull off the shot and the opponent gets to it, you are probably not fast enough to get to the other side of the net to cover the net properly, and they can do a lot of damage by playing a straight push or drive – putting you on defence. So the cross court net shot actually puts you and your partner quite badly out of position – not a problem if the shots a winner, but really bad if its not.

Furthermore, against a good opponent, the cross net shot can be quite easily killed off the top of the tape. As such by playing the cross net shot, you risk your opponent killing the shot, or putting yourself out of position. The alternative was to play a straight net shot, and then try to kill the next shot yourself – a far more risk averse strategy if you have the net skills to attack the net properly.

I hope you found my analysis helpful. I use cross net shots a lot at a high level, because I am fast into the net, have a good cross court net shot but am not otherwise a very good net player – I am trying to beat my opponents with speed and finesse, rather than controlling the net “properly”. Against some opponents, these tactics work really well, and against other opponents, I get royally humiliated. In those situations, I need to be much more careful, and play less risky shots and try to improve my net game.

Hate to be negative, but these mens players are a long long way from being top class professionals. If you were to pitch them against the top indonesian or korean pairs, they would be thrashed and in part its because of the ruthless nature of those top class competitive players – they are hunting every shuttle create a lot of pressure.

An interesting point about pressure in doubles: something I remember from an interview a long time ago. Back in 2005 (or 2006?) Anthony Clarke and his partner Robert Blair reached the mens doubles world championship finals – so they played really really well to reach the final of the years most prestigious tournament. In the final, they played against the top chinese pair Fu Haifeng and Cai Yun. The English pair were beaten with a scoreline something like 21-8 21-9 – an absolute thrashing. Once they came off the court, the English pair said, in an interview (and I will have got the specifics wrong, but you get the idea) – the pressure they were put under by the chinese pair was phenomenal, and they wouldn’t feel the same pressure even if they were playing against 10 english opponents on the other side of the net – i.e. there is no way their could replicate that pressure during a training session to match what they experienced from the chinese pair. Pretty phenomenal when you think about it – and it was all down to the power and intensity of the chinese pair (who were, by any standards, one of the best pairs of all time). In those situations, you wouldn’t be able to even consider playing cross court netshots or other such rubbish – you can only try to stick in the rallies!