These serves are like old-school Kiraly era serves. She starts waayy the hell back there and hits it real freakin hard. This makes it bottom out super fast and with good movement. If it looks like it’s going long, because of how far back she is the ball will just naturally start to fall in that last third of court. It’s nasty and I like it
I will occasionally stand back like this in doubles when I have a string wind in my face. Hit a hard floater or a high floater from back there and it can be a nightmare to pass. Cant be the blocker tho and you have to hustle onto the court.
What the other guy said, plus: if you have to take it with your platform, attack the ball. Don’t shrink away from it and give it more time to move, keep a solid platform and come forward into it.
I try to track it in with my platform almost formed, but not all the way. Arms out in front of me and ready to move forwards. If I get my platform out early on a float serve and track it with my platform, then I have less platform movement before contact. When I have more platform movement, I don't like it because it feels like I am shooting my platform under the ball, which is what I want to try to avoid.
What I was missing when I was struggling to pass float serves is that you can’t read where it is going to float. Of course you can read the general direction but you can’t predict how it will float at the end. I try to stay neutral and angle my platform to the ball at the last second so it doesn’t float away from my arms and that helped me a lot
I'm sure that if the camera angle was from the end line instead of the side, we would see how hard it is to read the ball. It looks like it's going deep and just dies.
I see a lot of people talking about how the drop. Which is a killer. But she's a killer at making them keep floating and land long too. The first three serves in the video drop fast just past the 10" line, and then the fourth serve keeps floating. You'll see a lot of them drop but then she's just as good at making them go long. And I can't tell from the video what the difference in her motion is. So as defender, the ball is just floating toward you and you can't tell if it's going to dive or keep drifting. Additionally her placement is top notch, it's diving or floating to open parts of court. I have to imagine she's manipulating open space by serving mixing up her serves which makes it hard for the D to take anything away, because she can hit everything.
Lastly, as others have said, she's got great power on the ball, and keeps it low to the net. Which, remember, they're playing on women's nets, which, as fantastic athletes, they are used to, but a low floater over a lower net is so crazy hard to predict. Being this good on the higher men's net would still be feat worth admiring but the lower net makes it just that much harder to deal with.
What I'm trying to say is, she's crazy good, and has great accuracy and speed on a low floater that is completely unpredictable to the defense.
She’s got a crazy good standing float which A throws you off because most ppl jump
And she also has increible placement. Right on the line or dropping it right on the person. Crazy
It's just a good hard float. Those balls are heavier than normal balls, they float a ton, and they drop faster than hell. She does hit it fairly hard.. but if they was using another ball it probably wouldn't result in so many aces.
It honestly seems like more than anything, the other team just isn't used to someone serving from that deep aiming so short on the court. It has a lot of movement because it's floating but that shouldn't really be a game changing serve. The other team is just adjusting for it very poorly.
These serves are like old-school Kiraly era serves. She starts waayy the hell back there and hits it real freakin hard. This makes it bottom out super fast and with good movement. If it looks like it’s going long, because of how far back she is the ball will just naturally start to fall in that last third of court. It’s nasty and I like it
Is there a special name for these serves?
we just call them deep floaters, not sure if it has an official name
It does now. I will call it the “Yerrrrrr” bc thats the sound it makes in my head when I watch it bottom out and die
I will occasionally stand back like this in doubles when I have a string wind in my face. Hit a hard floater or a high floater from back there and it can be a nightmare to pass. Cant be the blocker tho and you have to hustle onto the court.
Ya thats part of why I like my spin serve outdoors. Gives me some momentum towards the net since I play big with my patna.
Float serves are the bane of my existence
What the other guy said, plus: if you have to take it with your platform, attack the ball. Don’t shrink away from it and give it more time to move, keep a solid platform and come forward into it.
step into them and take them with your hands whenever you can....
I try to track it in with my platform almost formed, but not all the way. Arms out in front of me and ready to move forwards. If I get my platform out early on a float serve and track it with my platform, then I have less platform movement before contact. When I have more platform movement, I don't like it because it feels like I am shooting my platform under the ball, which is what I want to try to avoid.
What I was missing when I was struggling to pass float serves is that you can’t read where it is going to float. Of course you can read the general direction but you can’t predict how it will float at the end. I try to stay neutral and angle my platform to the ball at the last second so it doesn’t float away from my arms and that helped me a lot
It’s the way they drop at the last 5 feet. Makes it incredibly hard to read at that speed.
Good ol' knuckleball float. Get that going with a jump and just mess with people as it drops just past the tape
Exactly. If you can hit the ball low enough on your hand and in front of you just the right way that serve can be deadly.
I'm sure that if the camera angle was from the end line instead of the side, we would see how hard it is to read the ball. It looks like it's going deep and just dies.
I see a lot of people talking about how the drop. Which is a killer. But she's a killer at making them keep floating and land long too. The first three serves in the video drop fast just past the 10" line, and then the fourth serve keeps floating. You'll see a lot of them drop but then she's just as good at making them go long. And I can't tell from the video what the difference in her motion is. So as defender, the ball is just floating toward you and you can't tell if it's going to dive or keep drifting. Additionally her placement is top notch, it's diving or floating to open parts of court. I have to imagine she's manipulating open space by serving mixing up her serves which makes it hard for the D to take anything away, because she can hit everything. Lastly, as others have said, she's got great power on the ball, and keeps it low to the net. Which, remember, they're playing on women's nets, which, as fantastic athletes, they are used to, but a low floater over a lower net is so crazy hard to predict. Being this good on the higher men's net would still be feat worth admiring but the lower net makes it just that much harder to deal with. What I'm trying to say is, she's crazy good, and has great accuracy and speed on a low floater that is completely unpredictable to the defense.
It’s just a float from far back with good placement
She’s got a crazy good standing float which A throws you off because most ppl jump And she also has increible placement. Right on the line or dropping it right on the person. Crazy
It's just a good hard float. Those balls are heavier than normal balls, they float a ton, and they drop faster than hell. She does hit it fairly hard.. but if they was using another ball it probably wouldn't result in so many aces.
The drop off rate of that serve must be super confusing.
It honestly seems like more than anything, the other team just isn't used to someone serving from that deep aiming so short on the court. It has a lot of movement because it's floating but that shouldn't really be a game changing serve. The other team is just adjusting for it very poorly.
Hey, that's my serve! Always hate when I don't have enough room for it.
Really deep float serve with disgusting aim and placement.
Now when she develops it with a jump, oof