Tennis is fundamentally a battle of time and space. To succeed, you need to hit the ball quickly or make your shots faster to compress your opponent’s reaction time. You also want to open up angles or use a mix of long and short shots to throw your opponent off balance and make defensive positioning difficult.
Additionally, tennis is a contest of balance. Standing still is easy, but moving and running makes maintaining balance much harder. So, it’s crucial to stay steady when you hit, and to try and draw your opponent into motion. When they’re running around, they’re more likely to lose their balance and make mistakes.
I started playing tennis in my 30s, and now, over ten years later, my game has gone through three phases: growth, a plateau, and decline. As we age, we all have to accept that our level will gradually decrease.
The most obvious sign of decline is being unable to reach the ball quickly and accurately like you used to. If you can’t get into the right position, it’s impossible to play your best tennis — that’s just simple logic.
Digging deeper, the root cause of this inability to get into position is “leg laziness,” which mainly results from declining fitness and accumulated injuries.
Fitness decline and injuries are tough to reverse. We can’t fight Father Time, and there’s not much we can do about that. Many older players complain that their level keeps slipping year after year, and the main reason is the “powerless” feeling caused by tiredness and injuries.
So, does that mean we’re doomed to decline forever? Not necessarily — I think there’s still some “rescue” options.
Here are four simple tips I’ve come up with that might help you improve your game — at least slow down the decline.
1. Practice with Goals and Pressure
One common reason people lose matches is because they don’t perform well in crucial points — in singles, a lack of confidence; in doubles, lack of responsibility. Losing these clutch points repeatedly can crush your confidence and sense of responsibility, leading to that “I’m going downhill” feeling.
Confidence and responsibility are personality traits that don’t change overnight. But for tennis, I believe it is possible to boost both through targeted practice.
The trick? Set clear goals during your practice sessions that put you under pressure. For example, challenge yourself: “Today, I want to rally 50 shots with my partner,” or “I must hit fewer errors than my opponent,” or “I won’t make the first mistake.” Training like this gets your mind used to performing under pressure, which carries over into matches.
2. Improve Focus and Maintain a Positive, Aggressive Mindset
In tennis, losing one service game can mean losing a set. Each game has only four points, so every point matters. Many players aren’t fully focused when the score hits 30-30. That’s a mistake — the next point is crucial. If you lose it, you might be facing break point. If you win it, you could be close to holding serve or even winning the game. At 15-30, the next point can either give you a chance to hold or put you on the brink of losing your serve.
So, stay competitive and fight for every point — treat each one like it’s your last. Think of every point as match point — be eager and aggressive. That mentality will help you earn more points quickly.
On the flip side, if you slack off and don’t hustle—like gambling on just a half-step — you’ll likely hit a mishit, prompting the opponent to attack the next shot, forcing you to scramble more, and increasing the chances you’ll lose the point. Better to start with full effort from the beginning than to try catching up after slacking.
3. Reduce Unforced Mistakes
Check the match stats and you’ll see that unforced errors generally outnumber winners, or at least are the biggest factor in deciding who wins. It’s not necessarily about hitting the most winners — it’s about controlling mistakes.
In amateur matches, controlling errors is often the key to victory. I’ve noticed that tennis styles tend to vary with age. Older players tend to play consistent groundstrokes, while younger players often rely on heavy topspin shots. Generally, flat shots are more prone to going out, but topspin shots are safer.
So, as you age, focus more on developing and using your topspin game. If you can keep your return close to the baseline and in the middle third of the court, it’s tough for your opponent to hit winners, and you’ll reduce your unnecessary errors.
Practicing and mastering topspin, especially near the net and mid-court, is an effective way for middle-aged players to cut down on unforced mistakes.
4. Always Remind Yourself to Do 1-2 Technical Points
The essence of playing tennis well, condensed and summed up, is nothing more than a few key points, and the gap between you and the masters is often reflected in this aspect.
For example, if you hit a tennis ball with the frame frequently, you should remind yourself to keep an eye on the ball. And when you have to keep an eye on the ball, you will naturally be more focused, more proactive, anticipatory, early running, etc., all of which complement each other.
For example, you don’t stand still between shots. Even in doubles, you should keep stepping up as your partner hits the ball, rather than standing still stupidly. Standing still will cool you down and will slow down the restart, making it harder to get in place.
Similarly, it is important to play with your knees bent as much as possible, which lowers your center of gravity, which helps your body maintain balance and allows you to fully build up your push.
Keeping your eyes on the ball, not stopping your feet, bending your knees, pulling the racket early are the most common words that come out of the coach’s mouth, and you have to internalize them and execute them in the game.
Of course, it can be difficult to do all of this at the same time in a game, but we often remember this and forget that, which is a normal thing. In fact, if you do one of these things, the quality of your shots and the condition of your game will improve dramatically.
Therefore, as we grow older, middle-aged golfers are completely worthy of “rescuing”, and such “rescue” does not depend on others, we just need to “save ourselves”.
