Serving

Hi Alois.

I'm having a great time ploughing through your brilliant DVD's. A question on serving, whenever I umpire a match at the level I play I am constantly amazed at the amount of illegal serves and nobody seems to care! I see the ball cupped in the hand, thrown back at 45° and nowhere near 6 inches in height. I called a foul in one match but it created so much ill feeling I gave up. Now I have a word with the player at the end of the match. Will that make any difference to them, somehow I doubt it. Anyway my question surprisingly concerns you and Jeff! The rule is the ball should be thrown up vertically but unless my eyesight is fading it seems to me you and jeff throw the ball backwards slightly which helps the bat to make an early contact. Is there any flexibility in the rule and would you get away with that at the top level.  I'm probably being pickey but I'm just curious.  Perhaps it's a legacy of my working life as an architect, if something should be vertical, man it's gotta BE vertical! Apart from all that  I am very impressed with the clarity and thoroughness of the lessons.

Best wishes

Bill Clarke

Hi Bill,

We do sometimes stray which we are trying to be more mindful of now.  In tournaments you do normally get away with what we are doing.  It usually has to be thrown in a fair way to be called by the umpire.  It is one of those grey areas of teh service rule that makes all our lives a bit more difficult.  Luckily we are not architects! 

Glad you are enjoying the DVDs.