Hi Nauman

Welcome to the forum.

I agree that footwork is important. If you can’t reach the shuttle, it doesn’t matter how good your technique is, you won’t return the shuttle.

Sometimes it’s a touch choice between focussing on footwork as part of the preparation of the stroke cycle, or focus on the hitting technique.

At the moment I am working with 2 very talented under 17 players. My summer program is based around footwork. This means travelling to the shuttle and then makig sure your recovery is just as good to cover the opponents next shot.

In my opinion (hint, hint) players spend too little time on recovering from a shot.

If you watch Lin Dan, for me his greatest asset is his movement. He is supreme at recovering from difficult situations and I believe this is what sets him apart from many other high ranking players.

So practice footwork at every opportunity because you depend on it to play your shots.

Great post Nauman

To your success

Paul

Thanks for the posts on this topic.

There are two things that are both vitally important to improve your footwork.

1) technique, including patterns. (there is no one size fits all technique – Lin Dan moves slightly different to Taufik or LCW) Also we need to consider whether we’re discussing singles, doubles or mixed.

2) The second element I have never written about before and will be the featured in more detail in my next article due out on Tuesday. The othr vital element is developing your internal clock. You see, we all have a movement clock – a level of pace we’re happy to play at. It’s the pace we’d play at if we could choose in a game. Whenever we’re subjected to a faster or slower pace we almost out of our comfort zone and therefore more likely to make mistakes.

So, whilst you’re learning your footwork patterns, you also need to consider increasing the speed of your internal clock.

Paul

Tony

This is typical of most club badminton. Players go to club to play, not learn and that's why I rarely accept invitations to clubs these days. There is little or no dedication to improvement anymore. Many players want the “easy route” to becoming a better player and don't realise that coaching is the easy route.

To improve your recovery practice your movement with the words hit, 1,2 in your mind. By the time you reach 2 you must have returned to your base position. Speed up the count when you become fast enough.

To your success

Paul