The Inner Coach

CHAPTER 1 Philosophy of Match Play

Question: I understand your point about not changing a winning strategy, but is it not also important to keep an opponent guessing?

Answer: I think this is one of the reasons a player makes a change even though he is winning. As long as the opponent has not figured out how to beat you, I would keep winning as many points as possible in the same manner. You have to be constantly aware of and monitoring the percentage of points you and your opponent are winning. At first, you may be winning 90% or more of the points. As long as you are winning a majority of the points, I would continue with that tactic or strategy. As your opponent starts to win more points, you need to understand why it is happening. Is he playing the same way, just better, which allows him to defend your play more consistently or has he countered with a different tactic which helps him win more points. This monitoring will help you develop a sixth sense of when it is time to make a change in order to prevent a momentum shift.

You have to guard against being too creative trying to keep your opponent guessing-that gets many players in trouble. There is time to surprise your opponent which we will be covering in Chapter 6, 7, and 8.  You can keep your opponent off-balanced by alternating working the point with dictating the point explained in Chapter 6 or by successfully defending his tactics and strategy.