Joined
·
56,571 Posts
You could feel it even in set 1, 4 DFs, a few coming near the end of the set almost jeopardising closing the set on serve.
It got worse as the match wore on, including 3 in one game. I lost count but it was at least 14 DFs all up.
Many of these were half up up the net, no forward power whatsoever. Frightening for a player as tall as he is. As the saying goes, what use is a big johnson if you can't get it up in bed or get your girl to achieve orgasm?
To me, the coaching team should make one immediate change to that second serve. If you watch closely at some videos, you will see what the issue is.
Tonight it was rather obvious from the TV angle as he served from the far end. Zverev has a very high ball toss. It's high for the first serve already relative to many players, but it's even higher on the second serve, so much the ball toss disappeared off the top of the screen. I don't think I've seen an ATP player with such a high ball toss, not even the Anderson serve. I'm no expert when it comes to serving, but it seems to me that he loses leverage on second serve by having such a high ball toss. This might seem counterintuitive, but it seems to make sense.
On the women's tour, you will see most ladies use a high ball toss. They use the height to help them get a bit extra power that they are lacking from their bodies (technically speaking; some women like Serena have good serves by making better use of their whole body/kinetic chain). But male players of average height or tall generally should have enough natural leverage through their trunk, legs and shoulder, working the kinetic chain as a speed multiplier. On the first serve, he uses more legs and forward action so there's not a big issue with the high toss (actually the ball kicks off very well). But on second serve, Zverev tossing the ball so high just gives him a far more difficult ball to work with, and certainly provides more room for him to decelerate during the shot, hence some really sloppy looking serves that keel over at the net. If I were to do one thing to the Zverev second serve, it would be to dampen that ball toss a bit, because clearly he is trying to catch up to it rather than go after it.
What are your thoughts?
It got worse as the match wore on, including 3 in one game. I lost count but it was at least 14 DFs all up.
Many of these were half up up the net, no forward power whatsoever. Frightening for a player as tall as he is. As the saying goes, what use is a big johnson if you can't get it up in bed or get your girl to achieve orgasm?
To me, the coaching team should make one immediate change to that second serve. If you watch closely at some videos, you will see what the issue is.
Tonight it was rather obvious from the TV angle as he served from the far end. Zverev has a very high ball toss. It's high for the first serve already relative to many players, but it's even higher on the second serve, so much the ball toss disappeared off the top of the screen. I don't think I've seen an ATP player with such a high ball toss, not even the Anderson serve. I'm no expert when it comes to serving, but it seems to me that he loses leverage on second serve by having such a high ball toss. This might seem counterintuitive, but it seems to make sense.
On the women's tour, you will see most ladies use a high ball toss. They use the height to help them get a bit extra power that they are lacking from their bodies (technically speaking; some women like Serena have good serves by making better use of their whole body/kinetic chain). But male players of average height or tall generally should have enough natural leverage through their trunk, legs and shoulder, working the kinetic chain as a speed multiplier. On the first serve, he uses more legs and forward action so there's not a big issue with the high toss (actually the ball kicks off very well). But on second serve, Zverev tossing the ball so high just gives him a far more difficult ball to work with, and certainly provides more room for him to decelerate during the shot, hence some really sloppy looking serves that keel over at the net. If I were to do one thing to the Zverev second serve, it would be to dampen that ball toss a bit, because clearly he is trying to catch up to it rather than go after it.
What are your thoughts?