Avoid Your Opponent's Strengths - Common Ping-Pong Sayings

This is a frequent piece of advice passed on to new table tennis players:
Avoid playing to your opponent's strengths - play to his weaknesses instead.

At first glance, this makes perfect sense - after all, why would you want to give your opponent the chance to use his best shots? And taking advantage of his weaknesses has to be a good idea, right?

Most of the time, I'd agree. But as for most rules, you can argue that there is an exception or two under certain circumstances.

Imagine this scenario - that you are playing an opponent who has a very strong shot from a certain situation - such as a very powerful inside-out cross court forehand loop put away from his backhand corner. This is a favorite point-winner for your opponent, and one that he plays most of the time when he gets the chance (i.e. given the right ball, he plays the inside-out cross court stroke 80% of the time, and the down the line or into the body stroke only 20% of the time). Knowing this information thanks to scouting your opponent, here are some arguments in favor of playing to your opponent's strength.

Playing to Your Opponent's Strength - Pros

In this case, playing to your opponent's strength would be placing the ball towards his backhand corner, deep enough so that he can make a full swing on the ball, and slow enough for him to play the ball aggressively instead of defensively (e.g. you would use a push, flip, or block).

• If you place the ball into his 'trigger' area, the chances are good that he will use his favorite stroke, which allows you to anticipate where the ball will be going and what type of stroke he will be using. Knowing this, you can get into position for a good counterattack.
• If you place the ball into his 'trigger' area on purpose instead of by accident, or because you were forced to do so, you may be able to make the ball more difficult to attack strongly (i.e. by putting more spin on the ball, hitting it deeper or lower, or forcing your opponent to move a little more). Your opponent will find it harder to hit a winner, but he will still be tempted to go for his favorite stroke since it is in his preferred area. If he hits with full power, this will increase the chances of him making a mistake, and if he plays the ball a little more safely, this increases your chances of making a strong counterattack.
• If you feel especially daring, you can actually start moving in the direction that your opponent would normally play the ball before he hits it - in this case, towards your backhand corner. By moving before he has hit the ball, you are basically challenging him to change his direction and hit down the line to the area you have left open. This can be risky - if he manages to change direction successfully you will probably lose the point, but it also has a number of points in your favor, including:
  1. Your opponent will see you moving before he has struck the ball, which many players will find distracting.
  2. Your opponent now has to decide whether to adjust his direction or not, which gives him another decision to make. And if he is weak at hitting the ball down the line, he then has to quickly weigh up whether he is better off going with his normal stroke or hitting his weaker stroke to the open area.
  3. He may have already set up his body to hit his favorite stroke, and now he will need to adjust his positioning if he wants to hit down the line. This extra movement will make it tougher for him to do so successfully.
  4. He also has to consider the possibility that your movement is actually a feint, and that you are going to come back to cover the gap you have temporarily left open. If he hits a weaker shot down the line, and you have stepped back into position, he is leaving his wide forehand area exposed to your cross court block.
• By directly challenging his strength from time to time, you also make the times when you play to his weaknesses more effective. If you always play to his weakness, your opponent knows where you are going to play the ball most of the time, and he can anticipate your strokes. By deliberately playing into his strong areas now and again, you force your opponent to cover the whole court, making your attempts to get at his weakness more likely to succeed.
• Remember that you must also gauge your opponent's strength against your own game. If your opponent's strength - in this case the inside out cross court loop to your backhand corner - feeds directly into a strength of yours - such as a backhand block down the line - you may actually decide to play to his strength more often.

Playing to Your Opponent's Strength - Cons

While there are a number of points in favor of playing to your opponent's strengths from time to time, this does not mean that there are no risks involved. Here are some issues to be careful of when attempting to take on an opponent's best strokes.

• You are giving your opponent the chance to hit one of his favorite, most practiced strokes - so the possibility exists that he may blast a winner through your guard regardless of your best efforts.
• If you fail to make your stroke a difficult one to hit strongly, you are asking to have the ball put away for a winner. You had better know what type of return your opponent doesn't like, and you had also better be able to execute it well.
• If your opponent is better at changing direction than you think, you are going to lose a lot of points every time you try to move early and make him hit down the line. Be very sure that he is not so good at changing his plans on the fly, or else he will simply switch direction every time you commit to your left or right.

Conclusion

I still think the tip to play to your opponent's weaknesses is pretty good advice, and you won't go too far wrong if you stick to it. But be aware that there are times when playing to your opponent's best strokes on purpose can be useful too. If your normal strategy isn't working, it might be worth your while to break with convention and see if you can shake things up a little in your favor.