Badminton shots: how to up your game!

Badminton is an ancient sport, invented in Greece about 2100 years ago. It has been played all over the world since then. It is extremely important to familiarize yourself with the rules, regulations, badminton shots, court structure, equipment, and techniques before you begin learning to play. Self-explanatory, right?

Nets divide the rectangular court into two halves. A forecourt and backcourt area separates the two halves. Singles and doubles courts are always marked, and the net poles are placed outside the doubles lines. Now, that is going down to the nitty-gritty basics.

Rallying starts with the serve. There are several restrictions and laws of service that limit the attacking potential of a service that is always hit upwards. There are four types of serves: high serves, low serves, drive serves (hit flat towards the back of the opponent's court) and flick serves (hit upwards but with a low trajectory). And trust me when I say that you can master every single one!

Shots in badminton can be played from several different areas of the court, so there are many different types of basic badminton shots. On a forecourt, one can play the following shots:

1. Net Shot: The shuttlecock is dropped as close as possible to the opponent's forecourt, near the net.

2. Net Lift: Taking the ball up towards the back of the opponent's court.

3. Net kill: performed by aiming the shuttlecock steeply towards the floor of the opponent's court, close to the net.

Here are some shots taken from the midcourt area in badminton -

1. Smash: making aggressive contact with the shuttlecock when it is at a high level in the midcourt area, to finish the rally.

2. Drive: hitting the shuttlecock with sufficient pace to the opponent's midcourt or backcourt when the shuttlecock is at your net height.

3. Push: this means to push the shuttlecock into the opponent's forecourt or midcourt area softly. A shot similar to a drive.

4. Lift: Playing upward into the opponents' court upon receiving a smash or push shot.

Badminton shots are usually played overhead in the backcourt area. Among the shots played here are -

1. Clear: Hit the shuttlecock high to the opponent's backcourt. There are two types of clear shots: defensive clears and attacking clears.

2. Smash: Launch the shuttlecock steeply towards your opponent's midcourt at high speed.

3. Dropshot: Throwing the shuttlecock downwards towards the opponent's forecourt.

As well as these, there are a variety of advanced strokes that are more or less slight variations on the basic strokes mentioned above. An advanced stroke is designed to throw your opponent off guard by adding spin to your shot. What could be more exciting than that?

A common advanced stroke is cutting, which involves hitting the shuttlecock with an angled racquet. Using slice shots, you can conceal the direction in which the shuttle is going to hit and make the powerful shots appear slower.

Using double motion to fool your opponent is another useful trick. A shuttlecock is first approached, then the racquet face is changed and the shuttlecock is struck in a different direction.

Triple motion is used by some professional players, but it's much more complex and therefore rarely used. The key to winning a badminton game is to use various badminton shots strategically. Hopefully, this article has pushed you in the correct direction to practice those special shots!