Tennis Beginner Lesson - How To Place The Serve with Slice, Kick and Flat

In this video, I'll show you how to place the tennis serve regardless of what grip you use or what kind of serve you hit - slice serve, flat or kick. This video is geared more towards beginners and newer tennis players but even more advanced players can learn from it :-)

0:00 Intro
1:05 Basic concept of serve placement
2:20 Placement with Frying Pan Grip
4:54 Challenges to getting the placement of the serve right
5:54 Placement with Continental Grip/ Flat Serve
8:36 Slice Serve
10:16 Kick Serve
11:16 Drill Progressions

More videos for the serve
Flat vs Slice Serve and how to master both:
Make the switch to Continental Grip:
Modernize your Serve:

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[Atty.KezeahNiere]

Learning, resonating and loving the subtle pro-women tennis coaching, Meike. Keep it up!!

[thetfactor]

Big props to you for teaching placement for the Deep Fat Fryers out there. I am not one, but I appreciate your acknowledgment of how many people serve this way, and not just constantly shoving the “right grip” down every throat.

I know folks who use the fp grip on forehand volleys as well.

You’re doing them a huge service. Brava.

[DB-CA]

The best explanation so far I’ve watched on YouTube. Glad I saw this channel.

[arceepee]

I was practicing today, trying to keep my grip from rotating on or before contact. It’s working well, although there is slight movement after contact. But I figure that’s not too terrible since the service motion is already complete. I also noticed a callous forming on the inside of my right thumb joint. Now I know I’ve got the correct grip.🤣 So there is progress. Thanks for the great videos Meike, you are far and away the best on YouTube!

[adean]

This is hitting at the right time. I'm switching to the continental grip and it's rarely explained how you go from the edge to a flat finish. Thanks coach!

[pphb]

really timely instruction video. exactly what I need

[klg]

Exactly the instruction I needed. Thank you!

[tennistennis]

Hi I love your content, these days I struggle with hitting angle under the net with pace could you make a video on it.

[tennisbum]

Great points, by changing the angle that the strings hit the ball you definitely can create different spins off of several different grips, but your emphasis is on going to the most efficient. That being said, would like to take the serve discussion down the rabbit hole and pick your brain. Do you see any difference in creating slice for a R/H into the deuce court for most players when their feet are pointing to the right net post versus completely parallel to the baseline and directly toward the alley? I see players of all skill levels using both, so to limit the travel time down the rabbit hole, assuming a platform serve, is there much difference in results in the two feet positions. .

[EM-NTHU]

Dear Meike, thank you for your wonderful and detailed instructions. I'm just wondering could body rotation (slight) help to decide the service placement?

[Better_Call_Raul]

Why is it relatively easy to curve slice wide to the Deuce alley. Bounce wide to the returner's forehand.
But it is much more difficult to curve the slice down the Ad T and make it bounce wide to the returner's forehand?
Ball seems to go mostly straight after the bounce. Of course the flat fast serve down the Ad T can be effective, but learning to slice away from the Ad T would also be good to have in the toolbox.

[kubolkudesai]

It is like to align a satellite dish minimal angle change on the ground -means great output in space ;)

[docpramod]

The very thing I wanted. Thank you for a detailed explanation.

[errorcode]

If you repeat the same racquet trajectory as for a flat serve to T but turn racquet to point out wide, it will not be a flat serve any more. Maybe not an extreme slice but it will be some degree of slice anyway, because physics.

[Better_Call_Raul]

Yes, it is best to use Continental grip. I have a bad habit of shifting my grip during the service motion from Continental grip towards forehand grip. Been practicing keeping the Continental grip throughout the motion. Sometimes I do it correctly so will keep working on it...

One thing I notice is that my first serve speed with Continental grip now drops from 80 mph to 20mph 😆😆 . Very weak. 😞

In a way, this is a good sign as it shows that I am now leading with the edge using Continental grip and getting sidespin. But eventually I will want to flatten it out. This will require getting the strings more square to the ball at contact. But it feels awkward and WEAK getting the strings square to the ball with pronation.

Pronation involves mainly the forearm muscles and wrist movement. But since my pronation feels weak when trying to flatten out the ball, I am experimenting with thinking more of Internal Shoulder Rotation (ISR), which involves the larger shoulder muscles.

If I think of ISR as the main driver that gets the strings from edge on position to a square on position, I seem to be getting better results in terms of flattening it out and getting more mph.

[bournejason]

What's the difference between flat and slice in serve out wide case? You mentioned it just a few degree racket face tilt from serve to the T in both flat and slice. It seems identical to me from your description. What am I missing here? Thanks!

[talesara]

How a pro hit fist outwide flat serve with toss in front not towards the corner? Or all Pro just serve slice.

[jinetduran]

I thought it was the shoulder which target where we want to serve ?

[yakzivz]

Once someone learns to serve with that frying pan grip, it makes so much harder to learn how to use the continental grip.

[dadsfreetimeclassicgaming]

Lol i usually call it "no person's land". I wish there was a better name for it. In german is that neifrauland or something?