My Partner is Being Targeted and We're Losing: Now What?

One of my students told me she was playing with a partner who was being targeted.
She estimated more than 75% of their opponents' balls were going to her partner and they were losing. My student said felt somewhat powerless and she wanted to know what to do. I've been there, and it's not fun.

I didn't know my partner was the Target Lady!

The answer(s) depend somewhat on the situation. You can practice certain strategies with a tournament partner. With rec and league partners, they may not be familiar with certain strategies that require coordination, and you might struggle to execute them as a team, but if you are bleeding points, it might be worth a try. Here are a few strategies you can try. Simpler strategies that require less coordination will be easier to execute with casual partners.

Call a time out

Virtually every tournament, and even in some league games, teams are allowed time outs. If you have a time out to use, call for a time out to try to reset and regroup. There is a reason that pro players use time outs. Time outs work. They can take your opponent off their groove.

If you are playing in a rec game or any situation where you don't get real time outs, saying "time out" can sometimes relieve tension because it draws a red circle around the fact that you are having some issues. Take a few seconds to walk over to your partner and suggest something different to try. It doesn't take long to whisper one of the other strategies listed below to see if your partner is okay with trying them.

Don't let the game get away from you. Keep track of the score, and if your opponents score 3 consecutive points in a game to 11, it's time to hit the pause button and make a change of some kind.

Poach

One thing you can try when your partner is being isolated is to insert yourself into the game by poaching. In case you are not familiar with that term, poaching is when you take a ball that was intended to go to your partner and you cross over to their side to hit it. A word of caution; not everyone is okay with their partner poaching their balls. You (probably) don't want a partner who is angry with you, so you might ask if they mind.

One benefit of poaching is that it can surprise your opponents and may take time away from them to adjust. This is especially true if the ball was intended for your partner who hadn't made it all the way to the net, and you intercept the ball at the kitchen line with an overhead.

Another benefit of poaching is that it can take pressure off your partner. Your partner likely knows every ball is going to them. Just by grabbing a ball or two from the middle-ish area can help take some of that tension away from a partner that is bearing the brunt of the work.

Poaching does carry some risks. The main issue is positioning. Make sure you keep your  poached balls low enough so they cannot attack them and hit to open court behind you. 

Don't try to do too much with unattackable balls. It is easy to let your frustration get the better of you in these situations and you might be thinking you have been starved of opportunities so you have to win the rally any time you touch the ball. This is a bad idea. Remember that your poached ball does not have to be a winner. If you get an opportunity to hit a high ball, sure, put it away. But, poaching a dink as a volley in the middle, when your opponents were expecting it to go to the opposite side and bounce before it came back to them can be enough to catch your opponents off their guard. Hitting a low dink volley takes time away from your opponents. Keep it low, but get it over the net. Even grabbing a dink on a ground stroke (meaning you let it bounce) that is somewhat in the middle can help take pressure off your partner. Be careful about where and how you send it. If you send that ball back to the opponent on your side, there is a chance they can hit it behind you.

You just have to make sure your partner is okay with it and then be ready to pounce on any opportunity. A little communication helps too when balls are in the middle. "Me" or "I go" are good ways to let your partner know you are stepping in when you are close.

One more thing. In order to compensate for you shifting far onto their side of the court, your partner might decide to cross to your side. I tell my partners to just let me know where they are going if they are behind me. "Switch" or "stay there" lets me know they are crossing behind me to cover the other side.

Bide your time and use poaching as an opportunity to take pressure off your partner. This is a strategy that doesn't require much coordination if you don't go too far into your partner's side. 

Changes shot selection/pacing

What tools does your partner have in their arsenal, and what kinds of shots have they been using? If they have been hitting drives, soften things up and slow it down. If they have been playing the soft game, can they hit with some power?

Lobs can also be an effective way to change the dynamic of the game. You can pull your opponents off the line if they are set at the kitchen. If you can surprise them, a lob can cause confusion and mishits. If you successfully pull your opponents back to the baseline, be sure to close and get yourself to the kitchen line so you can fully capitalize on the positional advantage you have created. Obviously, lobs have downsides too. If your lobs are sailing out, that is not good. If you don't send them deep enough, you may get blasted with an overhead. But if your team is losing, playing the same game is not a winning strategy either.

Stacking and switching

This may seem scary or foreign to you, but it doesn't have to be complicated. The server and receiver must be in the specified position. After that, you can play any ball from anywhere on the court. Also, you can do it as many or as few times as you want and then go back to your regular game. The key is to know who is the even player and who is the odd player and make sure you are in the correct positions for the serve or return.

Whoever was the first server for the game on your team, that person is the even server. Any time your score is an even number, that player should be on the right side for the serve or the return. If your score is odd, the first server should be on the left side for the serve or return and the odd player is on the right side. It's that simple.

If your team is serving, once the server hits the serve from the correct position, partners can play on either side. If your team is receiving, the receiver must hit the return from the correct side, but they can go to the opposite side of the court once the return has been hit.

Stacking and switching are a little easier when you are serving than when you are receiving because the distance the receiver has to cover to cross to the kitchen line on the opposite side of the net means it will either take more time, or they have to move more quickly. If your opponents are paying close attention and they are good at firing off a drive while the partner is on the move, this can be a risk. However, because the player at the net is sliding through the middle, as you switch positions, that can present an opportunity to poach that ball.

What makes this a solution to targeting? Switching and stacking is one more way you can disrupt the pattern. By drawing your opponent's attention to something new that is happening, and by forcing them to change the direction of their attacks, errors can happen, opportunities to poach can happen, and you can change the dynamic. Sometimes it only takes one or two small victories to reset the game and shift the momentum. 

I recommend you try this in rec play. If you have a tournament partner, practice switching and stacking. I am working on future articles that will go into switching and stacking in greater detail, but there are great videos on YouTube that demonstrate the strategy. If you are interested in trying it, do a quick search on YouTube and watch to learn more.

This strategy takes more coordination than some of the others. Stacking and switching on the serve is a little easier than when you are receiving. If your partner is quick and you can cover the net well, you might try a switch when they are receiving. If you are quick, and you can get to the net quickly, you might have them slide when you are receiving.

Sometimes, just that extra movement on the court can throw your opponents off their game for long enough to get the serve back.

For more on Stacking and Switching, check out these articles.

Stacking Strategy: Part 1

Stacking Strategy: Part 2

Fake the switch

This is relatively easy to pull off and you don't have to be very experienced to try it. You don't have to be exceptionally quick. You can do it when you are receiving or serving. You execute the fake by moving as if you are going to switch, but stopping and not completing the switch. 

If my partner hits the return and I am at the net, I would make a hop to the middle as if I was going to cross over. My partner might also fake to the middle as they run to the net. This helps complete the illusion, but it's not necessary. Many times, the movement of the player at the net is sufficient to draw a shot from your opponents to that side rather than to your partner's side. As long as you can hop back to your position before the ball gets to you (don't move so far that you can't get back), you now have a ball you can volley that was not sent to your partner who is being targeted. Voila! You have changed the script and you are hitting a ball instead of your partner.

Let your partner know you are going to do this before you do it. Once again, there are signals you can give to let them know and this is a plan you can practice in rec games and with tournament partners. One reason it works well is that players think they see an opportunity to hit a drive down an open lane. They will often rush their shot because they get excited and hit into the net, hit the ball wide, or hit it deep because they are trying to take advantage of what they think might be a positional error. Experiment and see if it works for you.

Turnabout is fair play

Pick on the weaker player from their team and put some pressure on that player. That player may crumble under the pressure. You might cause their partner to attempt to poach and insert him/herself into the game. If so, you might then be able to capitalize on a positional mistake that player has made. 

If you tried isolating one player and that isn't working, then try the other player. Sometimes the person that is more aggressive and/or more powerful isn't actually the more consistent player. They might be used to playing the role of causing the trouble, but they might not used to having to sustain longer rallies and pressure. It's worth a try.

Have you tried any of these tactics? Do they work for you? Do you have other strategies you employ when your partner is getting picked on? Also, are there any topics or questions you would like me to cover? Share in the comments below!

Thanks for stopping by the No Fun Zone.

David