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Hi, I'm Steve Townsend and I'm going to talk to you a little bit about playing a topspin drop shot.

Usually when we play a drop shot into the front of the court we put a little bit of slice or cut on the ball to help us control it. However sometimes you may have noticed that the top pros actually rolling their racket over the top of the ball.

I'm going to explain to you why! If the ball is really close to the side wall and you try to slice the ball or cut the ball you need an open racket face.

When your racket comes in this way and you clip the wall, the wall has a tendency to go even more open and you will probably slice it too much and miss hit the ball.

If you come with a slightly rolled action coming up and over the racket won't now skim underneath it but skim over and roll your racket over the ball. It has the added advantage here of giving a bit of toppy-side spin which will help us keep the ball back close into the side wall.

I just want to give you one tip to help you play this topspin drop shot. Don't think of it as a tennis topspin with a big loads of roll on the shot here...it is a subtle closing of the racket face as you push through.

The racket doesn't really topspin more than that. You don't need to be taking a big flick. This will help you just control the ball into the front.

In summary the topspin drop shot is useful when the ball is in close to the side wall or when you are at full stretch.

A good tip to help you play it is not to think of it as a big topspin shot but more of a subtle closing of the racket face.