Unpredictable serves to the backhand

My friend is much higher rated than me and often coaches me. When we play matches he'll sometimes throw in a dead ball or sometimes a heavy side top spin serve fast into my backhand corner. And because I stand in backhand corner to receive I end up just trying to block it because of the speed but if its a dead ball it goes into the net and if it's the side top spin it goes out to the side. What can I do to try and practice to receive serves like this.

Hi Chris,

Take a small step away from the table when you are receiving.  This will still allow you to reach the shorter serves and it will also allow you a little more time to see the faster serve coming.

For our Premium members we also have a video response to this, Long, fast serve with lot of back spin that should help.