Hi all, I don't want to create a post for every short question. So we can use this Short questions thread to ask quick questions about badminton technique. When I shuffle to a corner to hit the birdie, can I just hit it while I'm still in the air or should I land with both feet and then hit it?
If you hit it after you land, how "high" are you taking the shot at? In your situation, I am assuming you are in midcourt and moving backwards to your forehand side? In which case, I would do a directional split step, a few chasse steps to cover distance, then a "china jump" and play a smash or cross court drop. But you have to be quick to the shot and make contact at a high point for this to be effective. Otherwise you jump for nothing. If you are just going to get there and do a clear, then no jump needed. Directional Split step, Chasse, Chasse, Stop, hit, recover. If the shot is on your backhand side, then I can't imagine a jump would be necessary ever.
Jumping and doing a clear can be really useful if doing a flatter clear. Also, for any footwork there should be the options of smash drop or clear.. (though maybe less so for smash 'cos could be badly positioned).. If a player doesn't believe in clearing it when they jump then that could make them too much easier for the opponent to deal with.
Anything the pros do is fine. There are three possibilities in the FH corner. Flat where they cut it out. Really high so they get behind it. And late, low and behind them. You are referring to two of the three scenarios.. Flat where they cut it out. compared with Late, low and behind them. And the footwork isn't exactly the same for them even if you put aside any jump.. To the question of whether they are on the floor or not when they hit it. For the late one there would be a little jump like movement but their feet would stay on the floor. So it wouldn't be what one would normally consider to be a jump. They wouldn't take it in the air. For the flat one they would jump diagonally back to cut it out , taking with feet off the floor, and taking it when the shuttle is higher in the air and not as far towards the back of the court, than it would be if they were to try to take it further towards the back of the court. And also it's easier to recover to the middle when they are not pushed as far out. I'll attempt to find two examples and I may be wrong 'cos I haven't seen and analysed enough games .. i'm welcome to being corrected. but looking at Chen Long, the guy in the red on the near side.. The first pic is him doing a late Forehand corner shot. The second pic is him doing an earlier one where he cuts it out. There are degrees of things.. So there might be examples with a greater degree of late forehand or greater degree of cutting it out. (maybe those examples are a low degree of each).. but you see the two cases and the difference re whether his feet are off the floor or not when he hits it.. and the difference in height of the shuttle.. If you watch the second one full screen in slow motion (settings 0.25x), ,you will see his feet are off the floor when he hits it There's no way his front foot would land before his back foot. And the camera clearly shows his back foot. Looking at his back foot, He hits it then the front of his back foot lands, then the rest of his back foot lands.. If you want a blatant example of in the air cutting it out where you don't need a magnifying glass , look at Viktor Axelson here. A normal person might have had to take it late!
Not quite sure the situation you describe, but in general rule For any shot you do, you always want to hit at highest point you could achieve. Higher contact mean more angle option for your shot which mean more guesing for the opponent & Faster contact mean faster return mean less time for opponent to recover & also mean more preasure to the opponent. Waiting the shuttle come down to you are act of kindess to let you opponent be ready. Just hope they do the same to you or else you paid the consequence. Why waste energy by jumping if you didnt even use the moment to hit at highest point? What you do are jumping, act like going for a jump smash but do drop shot instead. Not jump acting like ... Then waiting you land & hit the shuttle. Its very kind of you letting your opponent recover their formation yet put yourself in bad shuttle position to hit.
