Texas Tennis 🎾 🐂 🤠 🌵

Objective

·       Two teams, one court. The coach feeds the ball in, aiming to score by keeping it in play.

·       The only rule is that the ball cannot roll on your side of the court.

Basic Rules

1.       Ball Handling:

o   Players cannot pick up the ball, but can pass it between teammates.

o   Players are allowed to take as many touches as needed (forehands, backhands, and serves) as long as the ball stays in play and does not roll on your side.

⚠ Safety! It is up to the coaches to make sure the teams are adequately spaced, and to intervene if there is danger of swinging too close to one another

🪶 Feathers (for younger / less confident children):

o   The coach should make sure to include all players, particularly by feeding the ball to weaker players first to help them build confidence and skill.

o   The coach should put assistant coaches/ parents on the stronger players on each team to control the ball and tee up the younger players so they can be part of it.

o   Make certain players “Setters”, stronger players can act as setters only, like in volleyball, so they can gather the ball and tee it up for other players in their team, but can’t hit over themselves. This is designed to stop one or two players dominating the play.

Variations to Challenge the Game

1.       Serve Start:

o   Begin each round with a serve to give players a challenge right from the start.

2.       Number of Bounces:

o   Change the rule to allow only a specific number of bounces (e.g., two or three bounces before the ball must be returned).

3.       Backhand Only:

o   Challenge players to hit only backhands during certain rounds.

4.       Targeting Weaknesses:

o   Rotate the ball feeds so that each player gets a chance to practice their weaker strokes.

5.       Timed Rounds:

o   Set a timer for each round, encouraging quick decision-making and rapid ball movement.

6.       Court Size:

o   Use half the court to make the game more challenging, or introduce zones where players can only pass to certain teammates.

7.       Add more balls: especially with larger groups, add more balls to keep the contact time for each participant higher.