Good work Dobbie! Always tough to play with a new partner at short notice – especially one who hasn’t practiced in so long!

I wanted to raise a different point, in direct response to your original post – when should you decide to change something?
Firstly – you should never decide to take matters into your own hands – it sounds like you are going to all but shove your partner off the court! Doubles is about the team, and some simple positive instructions to your partner may help. Do they need to go for the kill? No. They could just play a simple block and keep the rally going, and hopefully you will eventually get an easy kill – but you need to work hard.

More interestingly… when do you decide you need to change tactics. As Paul said, most do it WAY too late in the game. I am going to offer an interesting idea, that works quite well for me… Warning – in order to achieve this, you need to be match ready i.e. you need to have warmed up properly, and you also need to have tactics in mind and be implementing those.

Now, an observation: Most points in badminton are won and lost through errors – e.g. bad defensive shot that pops into the midcourt… well, whilst the smash is the winner, the point was lost by poor defence, not by an uber smash. Or smashing into the net etc etc. Badminton really comes down to consistency of play, not how amazing your attack is (this is true at professional level, but even more so at club level).

So how do you know which side is “winning” at any given point?! You can’t wait for the end of the game – thats too late to do anything about it. What I suggest is you keep track of how many mistakes each team has made in the last 5 or 6 points. Most, but not all points, will end with a mistake of some sort (against opposition who are extremely strong, there may not be many errors – you need to work out if there is a way to introduce errors to their game!). I want you to count how many points have been lost by each pair due to a mistake. If your team has made 4 mistakes in the last 6 points, and your opponents have only made 2, then whatever tactics you are currently using are not working – because your opponent is forcing you into mistakes, not the other way around. This may be happening if you are trying to implement a tactic you don’t have the skills to implement – in which case, its like trying to pretend you have tools that you really don’t have in your toolbox today – everyone has an off day and not every tool we normally have is always available – so time to make use of different tools!

Once you have recognised how many mistakes you are making and that you should change tactics, then you simply need to decide on what to try next/what adjustments should be made e.g. try steeper slower smashes, rather than faster flatter ones. With new tactics, now start counting the errors, and what the difference is.

Do not get disheartened by lucky shots or unexpected winners from your opponents – if they happen, then you have lost the point but not through bad tactics – keep going and don’t give up!

Cheers everyone – slight diversion in topic, but something you may find interesting to try so you don’t leave it too late before you change tactics!