Deep and Down the Center of the Court
Sometimes one forgets about very basic strategy, i.e. deep and down the center, when playing tennis at the local club or park courts. Fortunately, the top coaches in the pro game are clearly thinking about the pros and cons of angles or lack thereof… Carlos Rodriguez, Justine Henin’s long-time coach, advised Henin to aim the majority of her ground strokes deep and down the center in her quarterfinal match against Maria Sharapova at the 2008 Australian Open while also favoring down the
line shots versus cross-court angles. This strategy takes away the angles from Sharapova while also eliminating any benefits from her long reach. Players spend so much practice time hitting cross court and down the line shots and aiming their shots for the corners that being pinned in the center of the court can sometimes illicit more errors. On this night, Sharapova came out ahead and won this match against Henin primarily because of her strong serving and control of the baseline rallies – Sharapova had 30 winners compared to only 11 for Henin. The negative aspect of this strategy (and a reason why it’s often avoided) is that the player has much more time to plant his/her feet and tee off since the balls are arriving closer to him/her. Nonetheless, this approach can often be an effective strategy against many strong baseliners who usually dictate points with their ground strokes because they can control the angles in the point.
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