Risk Management
Nick Wheatley
As much as the foundation of your strategy should be built around your strengths and game style, there will always be times in matches where lower percentage shots will be played. These tend to look great when they come off, but are also easily criticized as the wrong shot choice when they end up as an error or gift the opponent an easy route to winning the point.
It's often the down the line shot choice that falls into the risky category. So the first questions to ask are which down the line shots fall into your list of strengths, and which don't?
The ones that don't should only be attempted when there is a real purpose behind the shot choice, such as changing the cross-court pattern. The ones that you feel more comfortable with can be chosen more often, but again ideally with purpose, such as an opportunity to attack into space that you've created with your previous shot.
