Tennis Confidence - A Kind of Magic - Not

All tennis players know that confidence is everything. When you play with confidence, you play well, and most of your shots go in. The opposite of confidence is diffidence. When you play with diffidence, you play poorly, and most of your shots go out – simply because you fear that they will.

It is no wonder then that players get superstitious about confidence. They view it as a kind of magic.

Success builds confidence, and failure erodes it. So, how do you gain confidence when playing badly?

In other words, how do you make yourself believe in yourself when reality seems to contradict that belief? Stating the question in these terms shows how akin belief in yourself is to a religious belief, which often likewise seems contradicted by observable reality.

The problem then becomes a question of how to maintain this belief in the face of facts that constantly challenge it.

Many people resort to manufacturing an artificial confidence, convincing themselves that they have this mysterious magical power despite all evidence to the contrary. It's a kind of self-delusion, a psyche job. Though it negates reality, they call it "positive thinking," which it ain't.

Since tennis is head-to-head competition, they forget that this "magic" is simple confidence and view it instead as some kind of inherent superiority to their opponents.

Delusions are powerful. They can work. As Bill Tilden said, you can impress belief of your inherent superiority on your opponent = make him or her feel inferior and psychologically dominated.

But the problem with delusions is that they are constantly assailed by reality. Therefore, it's a struggle to maintain them. You must keep brainwashing yourself and repressing self-doubt as it threatens to surface to consciousness and break the spell.

Sooner or later, it will. Then it's like you lost your mojo, and your game falls apart.

Venus and Serena Williams are not the only pro players afflicted with this superstitiousness. So are Lleyton Hewitt and Marat Safin. In fact, many players are. It can make you a flash in the pan, but it will desert you someday so that you don't build a career like Pete Sampras did or Roger Federer is doing.

What's more, when your mojo is gone, your opponents come out from under the spell of inferiority, as Brad Gilbert did when John McEnroe tried to make sure he got the message in their 1984 match: "Gilbert, you are the worst! The f***** worst! You don't belong on the same court with me!" Gilbert smelled blood and went on to win. McEnroe immediately took a sabbatical from tennis and never won another major tournament after he returned to the tour.

Unbelievable. John McEnroe, the guy who gets mad at himself for every error. Never won another major tournament. That is gross underachievement for a player of his caliber. It happened because he became dependent on his mojo and didn't think he could win without it = that he couldn't beat an opponent who thought he could win. Baloney.

So, you see this artificial confidence is no substitute for the real thing – a realistic level of true confidence in your ability, true confidence that isn't undermined by every error or sent skyrocketing by every great shot. A stable, tranquil self-confidence that nothing can shake. One based on an accurate perception of the facts. One that disregards whatever your ego is yakking at you.

During the early part of the decade Venus and Serena dominated women's tennis, largely through psychological warfare that upset the other women, most of which was waged off court – in the locker room, on the practice courts, and on the tournament grounds.

Over time though, the other women caught on. They recognized the contemptuous haughtiness as a mind game and stopped letting it get to them. Venus and Serena have not dominated since.

I bet they never will again. But that is no reason to think that they aren't good enough players to still win their share of tournaments. Serena, especially, just needs to lose the superstitiousness and replace it with Andre-Agassi style modesty and hard work.

In the midst of all the gobbledygook and conflicting messages she sent during her presser yesterday, Venus said this in answer to the shark who asked "If people start talking about the Williams era being over, what would you have to say to them?":

I've been a champion. I have full expectations and aspirations to continue to play high-quality tennis and to continue to be a champion.

And she should have. Her track record proves that to be a realistic appraisal of her ability. She needs no self psyche job to achieve it.

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Australian Open: Marcos Baghdatis defeats Marat Safin

Marat Safin surprised himself today.

He came out to his second round Australian Open match against 15th seeded Marcos Baghdatis in the usual frame of mind, believing that he was going to screw up.

And he did.

Despite whatever he was telling himself consciously, deep down he believed that he was going to screw up. And then did.

If you know anything about this big Russian, you know that he thus serves as is his own worst enemy. Head case extraordinaire. And the frustrations of a year battling injury only compounded his struggle with a mindset that amounts to a deep seated belief that "I can't."


But we all know that Marat is a terrific tennis player who can.

How does this happen? Indeed, this is a common problem tennis players have, and it should comfort the rest of us to see that even a great player like Marat Safin can struggle with it.

Like so many human behaviors, this low opinion of oneself is actually a complex, a reflection of its opposite. For example, people with low esteem often go into denial of that, repress awareness of it, and seek to negate it through an internal narrative that pretends an equal amount of the opposite – high self esteem. Hence, an inferiority complex comes off as a superiority act. Deep down, no one has a lower opinion of himself than a malignant narcissist does.

This is something like that. It stems from the perfectionism that, for many reasons, plagues many tennis players. They actually think they should make every shot.

Not consciously, of course. I'm sure that if you asked Marat, he'd say that he knows errors are part of the game. But when you miss an easy shot, you think, "That was an easy shot, one I shouldn't have missed." The better player you are, the tougher that shot can be and still make you think that.

John McEnroe is probably the best example. To this day, he gets mad at himself for virtually every error. Ironically, no one ever came closer than he did to flawless tennis. But after two flawless sets, he can go off over one unforced error. Perfectionism.

This stems from the mistaken belief that you err because you do something wrong, that every error is some sort of personal failure. It's not.

To the contrary, every good shot is somewhat lucky. When you think of all the calculations and estimates the brain must make in judging the ball and timing and coordinating your stroke, you can see why. All this calculating and estimating is almost never perfect. Why? Because, tennis happens too fast: for example, the brain hasn't time to take enough snapshots of the approaching ball to judge its speed perfectly. It must guestimate. Sometimes an imperceptibly slight gust of wind or a grain of sand on the court can throw those calculations off enough to produce an error.

Of course, the quieter your mind, the more brainpower you have free to devote to judgment and coordination = the better you'll play. But nobody ever plays perfect tennis. We all regularly miss shots we are good enough to make.

That happens. Every shot has a probability of error. Even if the probability of error for a particular shot is low, sometimes you ARE going to miss it. Them's the odds. Accept them or find a different sport.

It's crucial to take your errors in stride as part of the game. Don't view them as personal failures, as shots you SHOULD have made. If you do, your ego pipes up, and you get distracted by the internal tongue-lashing it starts giving you. That just wastes brainpower on thinking rot and makes your play worse. It can destroy your game.

Indeed, it would be more correct to think that you SHOULD miss every shot. So, be glad to make the ones you do. The object of the game is to maximize the percentage of good shots you make, but perfection is unattainable.

The overemphasis on form contributes to this psychological problem in tennis players. It tends to make us think that every time we miss a shot, it's because we swung wrong. Wrong. You can hit a great shot with lousy form and a terrible shot with "perfect" form. Tennis technique isn't an exact science: it's just a set of parameters to keep your strokes within, parameters that make it mechanically effective, efficient, and minimize the probability of error. But it doesn't guarantee success.

After losing the first two sets to Baghdatis 4-6, 4-6, Safin turned his game around. How?

Not by any pep talk he gave himself. He simply got his attention focused where it belonged, on strategy and tactics. This is a simple matter of shoving aside the stupid things your ego is yakking at you and thinking about the GAME.

Marat didn't suddenly become a true believer in himself. He didn't suddenly find his mojo. He simply changed the way he was playing. He stepped up inside the baseline and started taking shots on the rise. He wins the next two sets 6-2 and 6-3.

Obviously, he has made this strategy change because he has occupied his mind with strategy and tactics, tuning out the noise his ego was making.

But then, as so often happens in these cases, in the natural letdown after catching up, Marat took a mental breather and gave away some cheap points early in the final set. Then the racket abuse blow-up. Note to Marat: Don't encourage your opponent that way!

Baghdatis is just too good and too determined to get away with that against. Safin let him back in the match, and Baghdatis was mentally tougher under the withering pressure and won 6-2.


Nonetheless, this match serves as a confidence builder for Safin. Via the BBC:

Safin said he had paid for making a slow start.

"It's a pity," said the 27-year-old. "I consider I should have won in three, four sets.

"The first two sets should not have happened. That's the first and last time I make that mistake."

Still learning at 27? That's a good sign!

However, the Russian said his performances in Australia had given him belief that he could rejoin the game's elite.

"It's actually a little bit surprising for myself to be in such a good shape and to play good tennis and be able to compete against top players for five sets with a chance to win.

"The year is pretty long, so I'll have my chances, that's for sure."

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Australian Open: Day 4

It's tomorrow morning Down Under, and Day 4 of the Australian Open will begin in a few hours.

The big surprise so far was 9th seeded Andy Murray of the UK losing to the talented Frenchman Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the first round, 7-5 6-4 0-6 7-6(5).

Murray actually won more points. Tsonga hit both a ton of winners (57) and a ton of unforced errors (61).

Today in the second round, Roger Federer, the world No.1 and top seed, takes on the 35-year-old Frenchman, Fabrice Santoro, and Marat Safin takes on 15th seed Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus, who reached the finals here in 2006.

Santoro is delighted at this chance to play Federer at least once before he retires.

Note to Lleyton Hewitt: Don't call your coach "Roachey."

More later when the matches are underway.

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Federer - Safin Preview

While you're waiting for the outcome of the Federer Safin match, you can read this preview, Like a Kid in a Candy Store, at Craig Hickman's Tennis Blog.

I'm a Safin fan, ever since the moment I first saw him play. Besides, who else could do this to ya?

You know the story of the hippo? The hippo comes to the monkey and said, "Listen, I'm not a hippo." So, he paint himself like a zebra. He said but he's still a hippo. He said, "But look at you. You're painted like a zebra, but you are a hippo." So then he goes, you know, like "I want be a little parrot." So, he put the colours on him and he comes to the monkey and said, "But, sorry, you are a hippo." So, in the end, you know, he comes and said, "I'm happy to be a hippo. This is who I am. So, I have to be who I am," and he's happy being a hippo.

Only the one and only Marat Safin. (Sigh.)

Check out the great photos from Day 4, too.

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