It may surprise you, but table tennis strategy can be quite complicated as there are so many different types of players. There are those who are more offensive minded and look to finish off their opponent quickly each point. Then there are those who play a steady table control game and pick their spots. Of course there is always the defensive minded player who waits for his opponent to make a mistake. Some of the following tips will help you with some or all of these players.

There are types of players called pips-out players. These are players who try to "kill" the ping pong ball by hitting it so that it has no spin. These can be very difficult players to play against, almost like trying to hit a knuckle ball pitcher. Here are some tips on how to handle a pips-out player.

For starters, add an extra amount of spin to all your shots. This will help you from hitting off the table against their no spin shots.

Another thing you can do is shorten your backswing. A ball struck by a pips player will come in faster so you don't want to get caught with a cramped backswing.

Also, try to keep your serves low. Make your opponent generate his own arc on the ball. This will make it more difficult for him to hit it back to you without spin.

What you can try to do to keep your opponent off balance is mix up your game a bit. Maybe mix in a few no spin shots of your own on your serves and deep pushes. This will certainly give him something to think about.

If the points start to get faster, try to slow them down a bit. Take something off of a few shots. You may actually catch your opponent off guard. Basically you want to force him to play your game and not his.

On thing you should do to keep your game at as high a level as possible is to practice your serve. This is something that you can actually practice without a partner. Just get a large number of balls and a table. When practicing your serve try to mostly use your wrist and try to produce a variety of different spins such as chop, topspin and no spin. Try to be able to do all 3 using the same motion so your opponent won't know what's coming. Practice short serves as these will stop your opponent from attacking. Then use long serves to surprise him and keep him off balance. Always try to incorporate no spin serves into your game as these are very difficult to hit. The more deceptive your spins are the easier time of it you'll have on your return.

In our next article we'll go over some more table tennis tips to help improve your game.