Ready, Set, Return

How to prepare your mind for returning a serve in tennis - by Daniel Ferguson

In tennis, it can feel like you’re at a disadvantage when being on the end of a serve. Serve effectiveness, which shows the percentage of points in which a player’s serve creates an advantage, is a useful tool in expressing this disadvantage . It includes aces, service winners, unreturned serves and points where the player is on the attack after a first serve. In 2023, the ATP tour average for serve effectiveness was 58%. In Wimbledon 2024, there was an average of 63% of first serves in out of the first 100 men’s games. This shows the player taking the serve has the advantage. However, out of the 8 leading players for first serves in during Wimbledon, only two won their match. So what should go on inside the mind of the receiver?

Roger Federer serving against Novak Djokovic in the 2019 wimbledon final

Picture this: you’re in the playground at school and see an apple core on the floor and being a silly kid you decide to launch it across the playground. But, as you watch it land, it hits the biggest kid in your school on the head, you’ve accidentally picked on someone not quite your own size. They start walking towards you and you feel scared. You feel at a disadvantage. Now imagine the player serving in tennis is that big kid, you are frightened of them hitting a ball as hard as they can towards you, this is how it can feel to be on the end of a serve in tennis, that feeling of being at a disadvantage. So how can you prepare yourself? 

There’s been a recent trend in tennis of deep returning, where players are stepping back further from the baseline to feel at less of a disadvantage when returning a serve. Some players have reported how this can make them feel, especially when the courts are too small for this tactic. Casper Ruud said, “you feel like you can’t hit the ball, like your in a cage” and Daniil Medvedev stated, “it’s a disadvantage.” This refers to deep returning, but players can feel like this anyway when returning a serve. When players are increasingly tall, serving is harder to defend, it gives you less time on the ball, Taylor Fritz says, “you have to accept you will be playing defence.”

Andy Murray returning a serve

Preparing your mind for defense

It’s up to the player what their physical positioning will be when preparing to return a serve, whether that’s in front of the baseline asserting pressure on the opponent, or behind the baseline, preparing to extend a rally, both can think the same. How can a player utilise their defense as a weapon mentally? Here are two techniques:

Game Face

Your opponent has the advantage, but what do they see? Do they see a player who’s fearful of their attack, or do they see a player who’s ready to fight back? Show your game face, bouncing on your feet, ready to strike back. Now a game face is an idea taken from Dan Abrahams which isn’t necessarily about what your face looks like, but about owning a way you want to play, it's about how you want to think when you play at your best and then deliberately thinking in this way when you play. This can be done by using two words. Have a think about you at your best, which two words best describe you? 

An example could be: ‘fearless’ and ‘dominant’, and then what you would do is repeat these two words when you play, like this example, when returning a serve. This allows a player to always return to their best way of thinking, when they find themselves losing control. It allows a player to own their own mind and be in charge of themselves.

Self-talk

It may seem your opponent has the advantage, but tell yourself these things when on the defense, to create your own advantage

• “I’m in charge”

• “I own this”

• “This next point is mine”

Tell yourself you're in charge, that you own this next point, this game is yours. You have control of your mind, use it. Fear can cloud your concentration, so when returning a serve use these techniques to boost your confidence. Fear can be as a result of your expectations of being at a disadvantage when returning, so create your own advantage, to be ready, set and return.