By Scott Murphy

A player who wants to be a force at the net has to put in quality practice time. When you're learning the mechanics, static practice is fine to a point. However, if all you do is basically stand in one spot and volley a perfectly fed ball, you're kidding yourself. Dynamic practice involves match like situations, such as; moving in, split stepping, playing a low volley deep, recovering, and then closing in on a floater and putting it away.

Here are few drills I use that may help you get started:

The "Rapid Fire Drill" emphasizes readiness, simplicity, ball focus and recovery.

Rapid Fire

The "Rapid Fire Drill" accentuates readiness and simplicity. I'll feed four balls in rapid succession, sometimes uniformly, sometimes not. I feed the first ball with a bounce but the subsequent balls out of the air. There should be just enough time for the volleyer to ready hop, step and volley, and repeat that four times. If the ready hop is ill timed and/or the swings are too big, the sequence will break down.

As players become more adept I mix up the feeds to accentuate watching the ball off the racket. This is also a good drill for practicing wide volleys. Emphasize watching the ball off the racket and recovery.

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