Deceptive, long, fast topspin serve

Hi! I recently played against a right hander who always serves long fast topspin. He throws the ball up and it's a plain topspin serve. The ball goes cross court or down the line. Me being a lefty, I successfully block the cross court serve to my back hand, but sometimes it goes down the line to my forehand corner. I'm forehand oriented and my receiving position begins at my backhand corner. Because I have short arms, I usually rely on my footwork to receive forehand serves but his serves are too fast and deceptive. I have no idea where he will serve. When it goes down the line I try to forehand counter but the ball goes off the table or I miss completely. What should I do?

Hi Mikey,

Perhaps take a small step to the forehand side to give yourself a bot more chance to make that one.

Also make sure you are watching the ball carefully out of his hand when he is serving.  This will mean you will pick up the direction just a little bit earlier.  You then don't need to do too much with your return.  Just block it back because it already has speed on the ball to go back.  After a while you will even be able to start thinking about placement of your return.

Once you start to see the ball earlier you will have little problems with this serve.