07/30/2026
A single-handed backhand shows a tennis player’s creativity, flamboyance, and artistry, Thomas Chatterton Williams wrote in 2024—but the move’s lack of efficiency may be killing it. https://theatln.tc/LGllQ1YG
While at the 2015 French Open, Williams saw the Swiss-on-Swiss pairing of Roger Federer and Stanislas Wawrinka. What struck him about the match “was the aesthetic mirroring of their backhand play,” Williams writes. “Both Federer and Wawrinka opt for a single-handed grip, which led to a number of exquisite backhand rallies the likes of which a contemporary fan almost never gets to enjoy.”
“What is so compelling about the one-handed backhand is the way a talented player can use the motion, especially on the run, to conceal until the last possible moment the direction of his shot,” Williams continues. “Power and consistency aren’t the only skills involved; there’s also subterfuge, and therefore artistry … In other words, it is more dependent on a player’s creativity than on his strength. It becomes a kind of signature that no one else can forge.”
“The shot, sadly, is almost obsolete,” Williams writes. So far in 2024, only two top-10 players have used the one-handed backhand. Not only is the two-handed backhand certainly more efficient, but “improvements in racquet technology and strength training have allowed tennis to evolve into a contest of power-hitting,” Williams explains. “This preference for brute efficiency has become the defining characteristic across practically every field of human endeavor. Verve and idiosyncrasy are indulgences.”
“And yet, winning isn’t quite everything,” Williams continues at the link—and efficiency isn’t either. “Fans respect and honor margins of statistical superiority, but when the balance tips too far away from style, we can’t help but feel depleted.”
🎨: Matteo Giuseppe Pani. Source: Stephane Cardinale / Corbis / Getty.
