The Best Shots in Tennis - 8. The Head (Tactical Ability/Mental Strength)

If classifying movement among the best ‘shots’ of tennis was a stretch, then trying to include tactical ability/mental strength in the series can only be called downright delusional, I suppose?. Now I agree that we could have had a piece written on the lob and the overhead each, two components of tennis which decidedly fall within the definition of ‘shot’, but honestly, what good would that have done? Neither the lob nor the overhead is particularly instrumental in winning matches in today’s game; I’ve known players who have built Grand Slam-winning careers by eschewing the overhead entirely from their repertoire (I’m looking at you, Maria Sharapova). On the other hand, the combination of tactical ability and mental strength, or, to put it more succinctly, a player’s ‘head’, is probably the single most important factor that separates a champion player from a very good player. In our final installment of the series, we take a look at the players with the highest tennis IQ and the fiercest stomach for a fight.

Men – The Contenders: Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer, Andy Murray, Lleyton Hewitt, Gilles Simon, Juan Martin Del Potro, David Nalbandian, David Ferrer, Andy Roddick

There are two major elements to being a mentally superior tennis player – your use of strategy and tactics to outsmart your opponent, and your propensity to remain unfazed when the chips are down (or in other words, your ability to bravely fight it out till the bitter end). It might sound a little incongruous to say that the latter quality has anything to do with the ‘head’ of a player; surely courage and determination come from the heart and not the brain? Happily, we know better than to attach such ignorantly romantic ideas to the mechanics of tennis – as anyone with an iota of scientific knowledge would tell you, qualities like courage, determination, fortitude, nerve, tenacity – call it whatever you want (you can even refer to it as, ironically, ‘stout-heartedness’) – are all controlled by the head and not the heart.

As with all the other shots in this series, here too there are quite a few players who do well in one area of expertise, but fall short in another. David Nalbandian is a master tactician who uses the angles on a tennis court like a seasoned mathematician, but is known in the tennis world as much for the purity of his ball-striking as for his tendency to mentally fall apart under pressure. Lleyton Hewitt is possibly among the most resolute players to have ever picked up a racquet – I think at one point of time it was something of a fashion to write the word ‘tenacious’ wherever the name Lleyton Hewitt came up – but his game suffers severely from a lack of variety. Andy Roddick is not unlike his Aussie rival in that regard, but he scores fewer points than Hewitt in both categories. David Ferrer is one of the hardest-working players on the tour today, and his strong sense of persistence spills over on to the court too; when you’re playing Ferrer you know you have to beat him, because he’s not going to defeat himself. But again, Ferrer is not known to be the most adept at outfoxing his opponents through cunning plans; such vulgar deception is not for the fair-minded Spanish gladiators.

Gilles Simon does reasonably well in both departments, but just like his lightweight groundstrokes, he falls short of the top dogs. Novak Djokovic has always had fantastic courts sense and acumen, and during his victorious Australian Open run in 2008 he showcased plenty of mental fortitude too. Alas for him, that fortitude never stays in place for any reasonable length of time; you never know when the self-destructing Nole who smashes racquets and sprays unnecessary errors will show up. Juan Martin Del Potro is the only player other than Rafael Nadal to have ever defeated Roger Federer in a Major final, and that’s no coincidence – Del Potro has the same never-say-die attitude that Nadal has displayed for much of the last 5 years, and before his wrist injury early this year he was also adding subtle variations to his bruising, bash-till-your-arm-breaks style.

The Nadal Battle Cry

That leaves us with 3 players, and it’s eerie how these are the same 3 players who made the final shortlist in the ‘movement’ category. Andy Murray plays tennis like a game of chess, as has been said a hundred times before. He’ll never give you the same ball twice during any rally – he’s constantly varying his pace and spin, carefully crafting the structure of the rally, looking for the precise point where he should put the hammer down and steal the point before his opponent even realizes that he’s being toyed with. Unfortunately for Andy, just the way he can embarrass his opponents with his court intelligence, he can also end up embarrassing himself when he crumbles under the spotlight and succumbs to his mood swings, a tendency most painfully obvious during his last two US Open campaigns. Now Roger Federer scores very highly here, just as he does in every freaking category – on a good day, he can even outfox someone as astute as Murray, and his victory against Roddick at last year’s Wimbledon final is ample proof of his stout-heartedness. I’d have had no hesitation in picking Federer here if I had written this article last year. But the year that Nadal has had in 2010 has changed everything. Nadal’s game is no longer that of the boring claycourter – now, he can volley, vary his pace and spin, slice his backhand, hit dropshots, strike pinpoint lobs and even, as he demonstrated so brilliantly in the 2008 Wimbledon final, throw his opponent off-guard with a sudden change in game-plan (I’m talking, of course, of his completely-out-of-the-blue serve and volley forays while serving for the match in the 5^th set). And when it comes to resolve, Nadal’s fighting qualities have already become so legendary that they invite favorable comparisons with the great Bjorn Borg. It’s no wonder a tactical genius like John McEnroe has been talking up Nadal’s GOAT credentials lately.

Winner: Rafael Nadal

Women – The Contenders: Caroline Wozniacki, Serena Williams, Maria Sharapova, Justine Henin, Anna Chakvetadze, Melanie Oudin, Alize Cornet, Carla Suarez Navarro, Patty Schnyder, Kimiko Date Krumm, Flavia Pennetta

The female players today may be infinitely more athletic, powerful and quick than the players of yore, but the increased athleticism has come at a cost – the women’s game has been stripped almost completely bare of imagination and creativity. The unchallenged, hugely effective mantra on the WTA these days is – see the ball, smack the ball. And if things don’t work that way, there’s always plan B – smack the ball harder. But as always, there are a few exceptions strewn amongst the top 100 players whose playing styles are a throwback to the days of Chris Evert’s artfulness, Gabriela Sabatini’s wiles and more recently, Martina Hingis’s craftiness. Whether these players will continue to make an impression on the world stage or be driven into extinction by the battering ram strokes of the big babes is open to debate, but for now it’s worthwhile just to sit back and enjoy this aesthetic brand of tennis while it lasts.

Anna Chakvetadze, Melani Oudin, Alize Cornet, Carla Suarez Navarro, Flavia Pennetta and those golden oldies Patty Schnyder and Kimiko Date Krumm all bring something unique to the table (or more accurately, to the court) with their little idiosyncratic groundstrokes laden with finesse and inventiveness. Now if you’re wondering why Maria Sharapova finds herself in this list, let me remind you that Sharapova’s willingness to do battle is truly otherworldly – you know the screaming and the furiously belted strokes just won’t stop until the umpire actually calls ‘game, set, match’. But as superlative as Sharapova is in the determination department, her utter lack of intellect or strategy in the way she goes about the business of playing tennis matches has caused quite some alarm amongst both fans and analysts, especially in the recent past when her results haven’t been quite so rosy anymore. Meanwhile, Caroline Wozniacki showed in 2010 that she can be as steady as a machine when it comes to dealing with match pressure, and in addition she also displayed signs of bringing some semblance of variety to her game. Now that’s a a win-win combination if ever there was one.

Serena's version of the Battle Cry

When all is said and done, however, only two women stand out among the crowd of names in this category. Serena Williams’s mental strength in the face of pressure has reached such mythic proportions that she’s started to make Sharapova look like a Dinara Safina in comparison. On the other hand, Henin has plenty of ammunition in both areas – the tiny Belgian has always had to fight extra hard to keep up with her bigger and stronger rivals, and her stylish, compact strokes with all those little variations and sharp angles have often invited comparisons with Martina Hingis. This is a really tough choice, but I think I’ll go with Serena here. Her game is not as monotonous now as it was when she and her sister announced their arrival last decade – she actually engaged Henin in plenty of intelligent rallies during their Australian Open final this January – and her fierce, even frightening tenacity has remained as strong, and visible, as ever.

Winner: Serena Williams

Read about the best shots in tennis:

1. The Serve

2. The Forehand

3. The Return of Serve

Edited by Staff Editor