Doubles

In singles, you just need to return whatever shots back and cross the net all by yourself, but in doubles, you have a partner, so as we all know, we need to work together with the partner to get the point, win the game, enjoy the game more or even simply for more safety.

Then what is the goal as a teammate in doubles? In my very simple opinion, ultimately, what you all should try to do is to let your partner play or perform more than he/she usually does.

In most of team sports, if you observe, it’s not that difficult to notice that there are 3 groups of people. One group of people don’t make their teammate perform better or worse. One group of people always make their teammates play worse. And one group of people always make their teammates play better than they usually do.

It’s the same in badminton doubles. Are you making your team 1+1=2 or 1+1<2 or 1+1>2?

Don’t dream

I think this is the first important thing to say. Don’t dream. Don’t dream that your partner can learn how to do double rotation right after you told him/her. Don’t dream that your partner can do a flat lift, just because you said: “Don’t make the lift too high. That’s easy for them to attack. Make the lift flatter, so it’s difficult to attack.” Don’t dream that your partner can do a good backhand drive right right after he/she has missed backhand shots 3 times during a game.

Telling your partner what he/she is not able to do is not helpful. Telling your partner what he/she should do without any proper training or practice is not helpful. Telling your partner to move to a specific location on a court under a specific situation during a game is not helpful. Even more than “unhelpful”, it also creates extra pressure on your partner and potentially more confusion as well.

So yeah, my sincere, respectful and practical advise is, “Don’t and never tell your partner what to do and where to move during the game or the tournament.“

In a tournament, during a match or on the court, you can always ask your partner to try something new. But you need to be very careful. Ask maybe maximal just one thing, and ask your partner “to try if possible” instead of requesting or ordering.

Advises and discussion are of course very helpful and important in the communication within the team. You two discuss together, practice together and improve together. This is what all doubles teams need. It takes weeks to months. It doesn’t help by saying something impossible to do on the court or in the match.

Manage your emotion

When you really want to win, you start to show your emotions, even though you can be usually a nice and friendly person. When your partner missed a shot (or many many shots), you start to show your frustration and disappointment.

It’s very natural that you have these negative emotions, but if you were the partner, when you feel these negative emotions from your partner, how do you feel? Do you feel you can perform better? Or you probably perform worse.

For some people (at least for me), it’s a perfect performance killer. Because I start to worry. I worry what if I can’t return the opponent’s next smash? I worry what if I can’t do a high-quality net shot next time. I worry what if my partner thinks it’s because of me when we lost a point. Then during the game, especially a high-tension game, all in my mind is worries, all kind of worries. The worry erodes my confidence. The worry makes me doubt my muscle memory that I accumulated in the past years. The worry makes me hesitate exactly at the moment trying to react to a shot. These all come to one single result: more mistakes.

So now after paired with several partners, I made my own decision: I don’t pair up with anyone who complaints or shows their negative emotions toward me on the courts or during a match.

After all, badminton is my hobby. I come to enjoy the sport and have fun. I’m not here to spend my time and energy taking someone’s negative emotions or complaints. I don’t want to be unhappy, just because someone tells me to do something I have never been trained for.

*Please don’t get me wrong. Here we are talking about complaint and emotional management and how emotion affects your partner, especially during a match.

What can be helpful?

So far, we’ve talked about all the things you should NOT do, but then what we should do to help our partners?

Probably we can think about it from the short-term and long-term point of views.

Short-term

In the short-term, I personally prefer focusing on (a) a bit tactics and (b) facing the pressure together.

When you are already on the court and facing a new pair of opponents. You are trying to understand your opponents through the few rallies with them. You are trying to understand what their strategy looks like and what each opponent player is good at and bad at. Usually, it’s quite a blurred image. It can be, “It looks like their man player is not that stable/consistent (in XD).” Or something like, “It looks like they really do a lot of drives and pushes and make the pace of the game fast.” Then probably the little tactic you and your partner can try to think together is, “Can we try to do long shots, such as flat or high lifts or drives to the two sides of their back court? To make their man player run right and left”, or “Can we try to make long lift (flat lift or high lift) to push them to their back court and slow down the game?” Under the situation that both your partner and you are able to do some specific shots, and you just discuss to select different shots intentionally in the game, the atmosphere is positive and the discussion or advise are helpful and practical. Of course, you can still feel the tension in the air, but the comments between 2 people are constructive but not negative emotion or complaints.

And no need to say that in the short-term, positive comments are always better than negative comments. Your serve is really good. That was a good defense! Return 3 smashes in a row is not easy, but you returned 2! Observe your partner’s pressure and emotion. Helping your partner have optimal amount of pressure and keep the confidence is your responsibility.

“You were not defending your position, and you just took my shot. When you took my shot, you just returned to the middle for them to kill.” This is a perfect negative example one my ex-teammate said during a game.

Long-term

There is no secretes. Simple and easy to understand. “Know yourself and know your teammate“

Know your partner!

1. What kinds of shots he/she is good at? (or feel confident)
2. What kinds of shots he/she is not confident?
3. How much pressure does he/she feel when he/she plays with you?
4. What emotions does he/she show during each specific situation?

Know yourself!

1. What kinds of shots you are good at? (or feel confident)
2. What kinds of shots you are not confident?

After you have tried to know your partner and yourself better, there are 2 things you can do: (a) train together, (b) create the situation that is easier for your partner.

In the past games or tournaments, under what situations did you lose points? (video record your games and analyze your plays and rallies)

What kind of practice or training do your partner and you need to do, so that your partner and you can do it differently under those situations?

If cross-court backhand drive is the weakness of your partner, how can you help him/her practice, train it? If your partner is not confident in drop, can you help him/her practice it? If the consistency of lift is not good enough, then how you can train it together?

Then the second thing: create the situation that is easier for your partner. If your partner is great in power and strong smashes, then you can try to do more net shots or return shots to the nets to force the opponents to lift. Then your partner will have great chance to do his lively smashes. If your partner is less-experienced and doesn’t be able to do most of the shots to a good level, then what you can do is to use your skill to make the opponents feel difficult to return, no matter it’s to control the shuttle to the 4 very corners of the court, or use deceptions. As long as you can make your opponents feel difficult to return the shot, your partner can get a better to hit the shuttle back easier. (of course, if your opponents are much much better, then there is nothing you can do)

In conclusion, again, there is no secret. It’s to know yourself and your partner. It’s to help each other train and improve together. It takes time, a lot of time.

Teammate selection

Sometimes, this is easy, but sometimes this is very difficult. The less you care, the easier it is. But in competitive badminton, we usually care a lot, if the very only goal is just to win.

If the very only goal is just to win, then finding a partner is very difficult.

First, you want your level is close enough, so that the weaker one won’t just be a easy duck on the court waiting to be shot.

Then, the enthusiasm (or available time) toward badminton needs to be the same level. If one person wants to train 3 times per week to improve faster and the other can only afford once a week, then this pair probably doesn’t work.

The last probably is emotional management as we discussed previously.

1. Similar level of skills
2. Similar level of enthusiasm (or available time)
3. EQ

All the others

Regarding tactics, rotation and positions, patterns, there are too many videos and materials on the internet. Coaches will also teach you these, so no need for me to mention any of them.

I only tell something that no one tells you.