Being Prepared for Your Big Match
Jennifer Mast
3/26/2008

When about to face an important match, you should be prepared beforehand, both mentally and physically. Doing so will involve you in the match before it even begins so that once the match is begun, you’ll be able to jump into it right away without committing lots of errors due to experimenting or the lack of being focused or of being warmed up. One way you can prepare yourself beforehand is to mentally review your opponent’s game. This includes finding out what his weaknesses and strengths are, what shots he likes to use, and what aspects of his game might trouble you. You should especially focus on the part of his game that you know will cause you trouble. For example, does your opponent have good serves or a certain type of serve that you often have trouble with? Does he play a certain style or have a certain shot that usually causes errors on your part? Prepare yourself to face that aspect of his game, and make up a game plan of your own to successfully return against it or to prevent your opponent from using it to his advantage. Also prepare yourself to be mentally strong in the case that your efforts might happen to fail at first or in the case of there being added pressure that such issues as the presence of a crowd or the importance of the match might cause.

Besides being mentally prepared for the match, you should also be physically prepared. In order to be prepared physically, it’s a good idea to hold a practice session that lasts for an hour or so and includes drills involving such things as footwork, underspin, serving, returning of serves, etc. so that every aspect of your game is thoroughly warmed up. You can even go so far as to devise drills where you focus primarily on making shots against those that are similar to your opponent’s (especially against those ones that might give you trouble), or if you’re planning to play against an opponent with a certain style, you can practice against a player with that same or similar style. Be sure to hold this practice session and your other preparations well before the match so that you have plenty of time to rest up, relax, and go over your strategy one more time.

[Playing Tips.]