Last Tuesday, I was called to play in an U16 Table-Tennis match for the school against Cheam High. Following my terrible defeat against one of their players in a tournament last half-term, I was determined to make up for it.
In the build-up to the match, I tried to practice as often as I could, to work on my technique and have confidence: you can see me in the picture at my Table-Tennis club for weekly training. Due to this training, on a Monday evening, I even managed to win my first ever league match for my club!
Therefore, the day after, my confidence was boosted and I wanted to put up as great a fight as I could. I had mentioned earlier that I had suffered a terrible loss against a Cheam player—it was my luck to be able to play him again. So, after a greeting, a sip of water and a chat with my doubles partner, Dorian (9G1), I was ready to play.
In Table-Tennis, patience is one of the greatest skills one could have. The ability to force your body to calm down and get into a rhythm is crucial. After roughly 5 years of playing this sport, I have learned that allowing your mind to work in sync with your arms and legs is what allows you to keep fighting for every single point. There are only 11 points in this game, so every single rally must be played hard. With this in mind, I managed to snatch away a convincing 11-6 victory in the first set.
But it never ends there. In the second set, my opponent conferred with his teammate and pushed through to win, taking maximum advantage of crucial mistakes that I had made. I knew that my second set was not good enough. Until this point in the match, I had used my experience from the tournament and only hit shots on my opponent’s backhand, but my shots were still too loose, and I needed to put more pressure on my opponent. I decided to be more animated in the 3rd set and counted on my use of the Chinese phrase “Cho!”, meaning “Good ball!”.
After winning each point, be it with a smash or a sneaky push, I said it. This put more and more pressure on my opponent, helping me to win the 3rd set 11-7. I started the 4th set by losing 2 straight points. This was not ideal. However, I won 3 consecutive points after that, and only lost one, making the score 3-3. That’s where the battle started. With Dorian’s words “Relax, Harsh,” I persisted. However, the set continued until deuce where I lost my nerve at the last point, losing the set by a bare margin.
Now, after a deep breath, I began my serve in the fifth set. But things took a turn for the worse at the very beginning. I lost 3 straight points because I messed up many simple shots! I picked myself up and counted to five before each serve of mine. Counting to five disrupted my opponent’s flow, causing them to panic slightly. From then on, with every single point that I won, I yelled “Cho!” and saw my opponent’s teammate stare at me as I tore down the tactics that he gave against me. I decided to defend for most shots, until a loose ball was given, so that I replied with a fitting topspin shot that set myself up for a big smash, which I luckily managed to land this time. We both fought hard at each rally, waiting for each other to make a mistake.
Luckily, I managed to keep consistent with my strategy of targeting my opponent’s backhand and I also yelled and counted to 5 every single serve. This led to me emerging victorious with not only an 11-8 victory, but a convincing redemption. Despite winning the singles and doubles matches following this, I couldn’t stop thinking about that match. Phew, that was close!
Harshvardhan, Year Nine