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[729 fx]

Push.
To my knowledge, there are a couple different schools of thought on the basic push stroke, especially on the optimal point of contacting the ball.

The way that I normally employed the push is to take the ball early, on the way up after the bounce in order to keep the push short and prevent attack from the opposition. Maybe some people refers to this stroke as a 'drop shot'. The intention is keep it short, if one can also put a lot of underspin on the ball, that's just a bonus.

Then there is a another style, is to wait a bit longer and when the ball is about its peak with a more diagonally placed blade, push through the ball keeping it low to the net.

I'm curious to hear what other junkies opinion are and why.

[varghese]

Good topic.

At the highest level of play (some players I have played at the US Nationals this year), it is too dangerous to give anything high. Even a long push they loop it and get the point. To prevent the players from attacking each other, they do a push until someone can open and kill it. They will make sure the push is very shot and have the double bounce. This prevents attacking. The Chinese coaches train their students to do this.

The second type of push is done by defensive players as well as attackers who do occasional defensive push stroke. This stroke will add more underspin to the already spinning ball. The ball will be long. It can be killed by a good looper.