Title: Sister Wives? No, Sister Sports!
Author: Sadhika Mani FY B.Sc.(2024-2028)
Estimated reading time: 5 minutes
There’s something very whimsical about watching a show passively, over someone’s shoulder as you drop whatever task you were about to do. I believe it functions off of the same principle of physics that makes watching movies so much more satisfying when you have your finals in 9 hours.
Prime example- I’ve somehow managed to keep up with 2,248 episodes of ‘Balika Vadhu’, all their cast changes, character deaths, and a whole new plotline of the main character’s children solely by standing near the couch when my mother binges it and subjecting her to my incessant questioning (she hates me for it vehemently to this day).
This is also exactly how I watched Haikyuu [an anime centered around volleyball], except this time my sister was the victim of my backseat watching. I’ll admit, this is a very unreliable way of watching shows and hence only a few, very specific scenes have stuck to my memory. One of these being the vague memory of Hinata (the protagonist) using a technique taught to him by his tennis-playing friend to receive a serve from one of the most talented and overpowered characters in the series.
Hinata, managing to link an incredibly niche move in tennis to a volleyball match is more than just some passing similarity between the two sports. This article is essentially a cesspool of words with me both streamlining and presenting my thought process.
I’m going to start off by comparing two players from each sport, best known for their serve. On the left we have John Isner, standing at a proud 2.08 meters tall. The man is known to have a mean serve that is difficult to combat purely due to his technique that he pulls off using his height. By leveraging this physical advantage, he hits sharp angles at a trajectory that his opponents find hard to hit back, resulting in most of his points scored aces (or service winners).
Similarly, Wilfredo Leon’s serving style is also characterized by his jump-serves, spin variations, pure precision and consistency throughout the match.
A lot of what distinguishes one player for his serve is also, in a sense, what sets the other player apart in his genre, implying that the foundation to have a great serve in both games is common.
Let’s pick another move that is core to both sports and similar to each other, a drop shot/dink. A dink is a soft touch used to gently place the ball over the net, often catching the defense off guard (volleyball) and a drop shot is a lightly hit ball that barely clears the net, used to force an opponent to rush forward (tennis).
We first have Roger Federer, known for integrating the drop shot move into his aggressive playing style. This usually ends up being a shock for his opponent when he moves fluidly across the court to the net feigning a smash, but instead gently touches it with the subtle turn of his wrist, winning a point. On the other hand, we have Sergey Tetyukhin using the same strategy, often catching the other team off guard with his eye for precision and deceptive dinks right in the middle of high-pressure situations where the opponent expects a powerful spike.
Both players have exceptional court awareness due to their tenure, operate extremely well under high pressures with a confidence that is disarming, sneak their way into winning points using under-handed moves to catch their opponents off guard and also; both players usually add a spin right as they hit the ball to the other side adding that layer of unpredictability.
The sudden switch up was startling even as a viewer, so I can’t possibly fathom how their counterparts felt on the other side of the court, with the hit of adrenaline still in their bones but unable to counter the move as effectively as they hoped they could.
Perhaps this was a largely long-winded way to get to the crux of my point, but what I am trying to say is that we can call tennis and volleyball sister sports because training in one could prove to provide the player with a unique perspective of the other game, giving them an advantage. Just as Hinata used his tennis friend’s advice to gain an upper hand against a player that many failed to defeat, Michael Schumacher switched from F1 to Motorcycle racing after his retirement and was pretty darn good at that too, even securing a podium finish at some point in that leg of his career, Rebecca Romero switching over to cycling after not being able to continue her rowing career over a back injury is yet another example.
This continued streak of victories only persisted because of the transition between sister sports. Motorcycle racing and F1, cycling and rowing, the basic skill sets and techniques that go into absolutely dominating these sports are all the same at the ground level. For Michael, it was his driving style and a refusal to submit to the slow pace of retirement that kept him going and winning at a whole other sport that he previously had no experience with. With Rebecca Romero, her endurance and muscle strength, especially in the calves, core, arms and thighs helped her absolutely demolish the competition in both rowing and then cycling. Rowing is to cycling, what tennis is to volleyball. Perhaps she was even better at cycling than she was at rowing, which brings us to our next topic.
“If you are currently not succeeding well in a sport despite being in shape and training rigorously, are you playing the right one?”
Even though tennis and volleyball share common traits, perhaps you are more suited for one rather than the other and can use your prerequisite knowledge from one sport to establish a stellar career in the other.
For example, Ashleigh Barty who’s the second Australian tennis player to be ranked world No. 1 in Singles by the WTA, took a break from the sport in 2014. She was encouraged by her coach to try her hand at cricket where she ended up impressing the field with her natural aptitude for the game and was said to have never missed a ball in her first session, impressing her coach with her adeptness. Ellyse Perry, also Australian, was known for her proficiency at both cricket and soccer, debuting and winning at the international stage for both sports.
I bring up these other sports as examples here because I’m afraid I have to admit that it is slightly unrealistic to have a tennis player switch to volleyball, despite the undeniable connection, at a professional level. It is, however, not uncommon for cricketers and footballers to two-time both sports, prime examples being Ian Botham, Viv Richards and Denis Compton and Ellyse. When it comes back to the topic of tennis and volleyball, I would love to name a couple players from both sports who would genuinely excel at the other but I will restrain from doing so, firstly because I am quite the novice at both sports and I barely follow along and secondly, because I refuse to risk facing the wrath of people who do follow both sports religiously, by suggesting something incredibly sacrilegious.
(I fear a person who follows a sport insistently as much as I fear someone who has severe political views and is not afraid to proclaim it at any given occasion.)
And this is why, in my mind’s eye, I consider tennis and volleyball the estranged sisters of the sports world, just as cricket is football’s sister and rowing is cycling’s sister. Very similar at the grass root level and allowing players to apply their knowledge from one to another without directly disobeying the rules of either game.