I played a tennis match this morning and my opponent had a very good strategy against me. He let me beat myself. He wasn’t great at hitting winners, but he was really good at keeping the ball in play when I didn’t hit a winner.
Given his ability to keep the ball in play it’s a great strategy for playing against a mediocre player like myself. But the problem is that strategy limits who you can play against. If he were playing a better player who could more consistently hit winners the gameplan wouldn’t work.
So the question I’m thinking about is does he have a good strategy for the long term? To be honest I’m not sure. In the long run I think that style of game has a lower ceiling than a more traditional player, but to reach that max capacity it may take more effort and training than he’s willing or capable to put in. I know myself I haven’t put the time in to improve my game.
As an FYI he kicked my butt. He was really good at lob shots. So even though I hit quite a few winners when I got aggressive and played near the net he had the ability to consistently make me run my ass of backwards to get one of his lobs. Then at some point I tried playing the middle so I could have the best of both worlds. That worked at times but I’m not super comfortable hitting the ball out of the air as opposed to off the bounce.