News & Coaching Tips

Welcome to our News & Coaching Tips Section

Glad you made it here!

This section is devoted to information and/or suggestions gleaned from the wide experience I have accumulated as a racket skills/badminton coach over many years.

I will be adding to these pages regularly covering such areas as specific badminton tips, coaching less able performers, making racket sports more user- friendly and (racket) sports for the elderly and those with special needs and many more – so please return to this section as often as possible to see if there is something which interests you. Please refer to the titles of articles listed below.

Feel free to make any comments or suggestions. If you have an article about something which fits well in these pages then please contact me We would be delighted if you could pass on any feature(s) which you think might interest friends, relatives or colleagues.

January 12, 2018

Walking Badminton

There are many less active “walking” varieties of dynamic sports which have sprung up relatively recently, the most long-standing probably being walking football which is thriving nationwide with hundreds of venues and teams. This tends to be male-dominated just as walking netball attracts mainly, if […]

July 9, 2017

Rallying – the very essence of all the racket sports – and other games as well

Wimbledon – Centre Court, Nadal v Federer. Nadal serves, Federer returns and the rally starts and goes on and on. And as it continues the crowd’s communal intake of breath at each net clearance becomes audible, the on-court grunts increase and the tension mounts the […]

July 9, 2017

Wimbledon – Let’s get a racket in every child’s hands – AND GET THEM RALLYING!

Wimbledon’s here again. We’re half way through the tournament and the standard of tennis, as always, is amazing – almost unbelievable. During a Wimbledon fortnight, I once heard the Lawn Tennis Association’s CEO state on the Today Programme on Radio 4 that “we need to […]

July 6, 2017

70th Birthday Badminton Bash

Being something of a badminton nut, earlier this year I decided to have a very different kind of celebratory birthday party – and not just because of the alliteration of all those Bs either! So here’s an idea […]

June 27, 2017

Co-ordination, co-ordination, co-ordination

Plusballs are the most effective way to acquire hand-eye co-ordination Having some degree of hand-eye co-ordination is perhaps the most important element required to encourage very young children into beneficial physical activity. Even without putting any play or sports equipment into the hands of a […]

February 14, 2017

100 Shot Rally with 100 Year Old Lady!

Plusballs have been used successfully in residential care homes. I took some plusballs and rackets into The Priory Nursing Home in Tetbury, Gloucestershire some time ago and after giving a brief demonstration to the residents and carers, I started rallying with a lady sitting in […]

February 11, 2017

How Schools and Clubs can Avoid Badminton Equipment Damage

I am sharing the following points as a result of my experience as a PE teacher, badminton coach and racket stringer. You may already be aware of some of them. If you order sports equipment THESE POINTS WILL SAVE YOUR PE DEPARTMENT MONEY! Rackets Having […]

February 6, 2017

How to Assure the Survival & Prosperity of Your Badminton Club

In my patch of South Gloucestershire, at least two badminton clubs playing in leagues have closed in the past year after a lengthy period when the organised, club-orientated game in England has been in steady decline since its zenith in the 70s. I imagine many […]

February 5, 2017

Balloons vs Plusballs

I’m often asked, ‘Why not use balloons instead of plusballs? Surely they do exactly the same job?’ Well….no! Here are the reasons plusballs are far superior for learning racket skills and for general hand-eye co-ordination routines. Balloons have an uneven flight pattern and are […]

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