Table Tennis England The Winning Edge Issue 8 | Page 12

THE WINNING EDGE AN INTERNATIONAL MASTERCLASS Opportunities to learn from Chinese legend Li Xiadong are rare, so we spoke to one British coach who recently spent a day in his company. The European Table Tennis Union’s (ETTU) Annual Coaching Conference never fails to educate and inform and this year’s, in Warsaw, was no exception. Attending from England was Gergely Urban, who was struck by the attention to detail shown by the speakers from China and Japan, in their preparation, structure and ability to analyse and adapt to changes in the international game. Just as glaring though was the esteem they held for the coaches. “On every slide of every Chinese presentation was written, ‘have good coaches and focus on coach education’. Before money or players, in China and Japan, it’s coaches.” Chinese coach Li Xiadong began with a look at how the change in table tennis ball material has forced the Chinese into a re-evaluation of emphasis within their players’ game. The move from celluloid to plastic in 2014 has, Li explained, had a particular impact on the physicality of the sport. “They have to make sure players are really physically ready now,” Gergely reported. “The ball is bigger and harder to spin than before, which changes tactics as well as the requirements on your body. “The flight of the ball is different now, which changes how it bounces, the speed you can generate with it and effectively an earlier dip. We watched a video of the 2017 World Cup Final between Ma Long and Fan Zhendong which demonstrated some new tactics like focusing on short touches over banana spin shots.” VIDEO: (// https:// www.youtube.com/ watch?v=pjwWIGnyTe4 //) Li also gave the conference some practical demonstrations of multi-ball drills. “He looked at the importance of your whole body working together, which shots to work on first, how to position your body. “The great thing was, these were things which are applicable at every level of the game. For example, I would start off by feeding semi-long, semi-high balls with a bit of backspin because the player would need to use their whole body to spin that ball back to me. What Li highlighted though was changing, after half a bucket of balls, to a normal backspin feed but asking the player to return the ball in the same way, again using their whole body to spin it back. “Watching that, Li would then be able to see how that player’s technique holds up, whether there are weaknesses in it. He would always be looking to find aspects of the game which bring out the most perfect technique in the player.” Those drills also bring the player’s whole body into play, which linked Li on to physical preparations. When it comes to working on the body away from a session, the emphasis was on the hard-to-reach parts, like the muscles around your knee joints and the small muscles in your fingers. “The Chinese aren’t just looking at arms and wrists, it is fingers and joints, using rubber bands to build up those areas. This was all in the context of the changes in the game and the ball, particularly how the fingers and wrist are now used and how much more we need to look at the warm down.” VIDEO: https:// www.youtube.com/ watch?v=Thqzpeiz2Xo Videos and slides on the conference will be available on the ETTU website. For more information or to enquire about attending in the future contact Zita Pidl - ETTU Project Coordinator ([email protected]) WE Gergely Urban (right) with Chinese coach Li Xiadong