The Accuracy-First Groundstroke Drill We Use With Junior Tennis Players in Sarasota

Why placement comes before power

One of the most common things I see when a new junior player joins us at Potter Park here in Sarasota is a big, fast swing that lands almost anywhere. The player is working hard, the racket head is moving, and the ball is flying — but rarely to the spot they were aiming for. My name is Michael Boothman, I’ve coached tennis for more than 30 years, and at SRQ Tennis the first thing we build is not power. It’s accuracy.

That’s the first of our Six Pillars: Accuracy Before Everything. Placement comes before pace. The reason is simple — a fast ball that lands in the net or past the baseline scores no points, and worse, it teaches the body a movement pattern that doesn’t hold up under pressure. When we add speed on top of a stroke that isn’t already landing where the player wants, we’re just making the misses faster.

The drill: 8 out of 10 to target

Here is the exact drill we run, and you can do a version of it with your child on any court in Sarasota.

Set a target on the court — a cone, a towel, or a ball hopper lid — about three feet inside the baseline and three feet inside the singles sideline, on the deuce-side corner. That’s the spot most cross-court rally balls should land. Now feed the player live balls, one at a time, and count out loud.

The goal is straightforward: 8 of 10 balls landing in the target zone (a roughly six-foot square around the cone) before we do anything else. Not 8 of 10 hit hard. Just 8 of 10 placed. When the player hits that number two sessions in a row, we move the target, change the height of the net clearance we ask for, or finally start adding pace. Until then, the number is the boss, not me.

This matters because it makes progress visible. That’s our fourth pillar — Confidence Is Built, Not Given. A 10-year-old who hit 4 of 10 in March and 8 of 10 in May doesn’t need me to tell them they’re improving. The scorecard already did. Confidence built on evidence holds up in a match. Confidence built on “good job, buddy” tends to evaporate the first time a player falls behind.

Why we feed it as a live rally, not off a machine

You’ll notice I said feed live balls, one at a time. We don’t run this drill off a ball machine, and that’s deliberate. It’s our second pillar: Live Ball Is the Method. A machine sends the same ball to the same place at the same speed, which is great for grooving a single motion but poor for teaching a player to read, adjust, and recover the way a real point demands.

This lines up with what the motor-learning research calls variable and random practice. When the incoming ball changes slightly every time — a little deeper, a little wider, a touch lower — the player has to solve a fresh problem on each rep. Practice that feels a bit messier in the moment produces skills that transfer far better to competition. The USTA’s player-development materials point coaches toward the same principle: train in conditions that look like the game you’re preparing for.

What good technique actually looks like here

When a player is missing the target, the fix is almost never “swing harder” or “follow through more.” Our third pillar is Technique Is Geometry — we coach the contact, not the choreography. Two questions sort out most accuracy problems:

First, where is the ball meeting the strings? A ball struck off-center, toward the tip or the throat of the racket, sprays in a direction the player can’t predict. Centered contact is the single biggest accuracy lever for a junior.

Second, what is the racket face doing at contact? A face that’s slightly open sends the ball long; slightly closed sends it into the net. Square the face at contact and aim through the target, and placement tightens up fast — usually without any change to how hard the player is swinging.

So when a parent watches us work and wonders why I’m not yelling “more topspin” or “bigger finish,” it’s because those cues describe the decoration. The contact point and the racket face are where the ball actually gets its direction.

How to use this at home this summer

Summer is a great window for this kind of work. Kids have time, the courts around Sarasota are busy in a good way, and a focused 20 minutes goes a long way. If you want to help your junior between sessions, here’s the short version:

Put down one target. Feed gently and consistently — underhand is fine. Count out loud and write the number down. Resist the urge to cheer every shot; instead, react to the target. “That one landed” or “just wide” gives your child honest, useful feedback. And keep it short. Ten quality reps beat fifty tired ones, because a fatigued body starts grooving sloppy patterns — which is the opposite of what we’re after.

The whole point is to make the invisible visible. Tennis improvement can feel vague, especially to a kid. A target and a number turn “you’re getting better” into something a player can see for themselves.

Want to see it in person?

This is the foundation of how we develop every junior at SRQ Tennis, from our 10 & Under group at Potter Park to private lessons. If you’d like to see the accuracy-first approach in action, take a look at our junior programs or text me directly at 941-239-4703. I’m happy to talk through what would fit your child.

Placement first. The power comes — and when it does, it lands where your player wants it.

— Coach Michael