![\"Greece's](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Greece-s-Stefanos-Tsitsipas-hits-a-backhand-during_1788792857031_52173319-135f-4452-bd92-cfa6a0b4263.jpeg\" "\\"Greece's")
Greece’s Stefanos Tsitsipas hits a backhand during his match against USA’s Ben Shelton. (AFP)<\/p>\nMumbai: On social media, a new campaign started after an appeal was made from the Grandstand stadium in the Billie Jean King National Tennis Centre in New York.<\/p>\n
Greece’s Stefanos Tsitsipas hits a backhand during his match against USA’s Ben Shelton. (AFP)<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019d like to start some sort of movement,\u201d said Stefanos Tsitsipas on Saturday. \u201c#Keeponehanderalive.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hours later, the Greek would post on his X account: \u201cI\u2019ve got a 150-year streak to save.\u201d<\/p>\n
The streak he referred to was of at least one men\u2019s singles player with a one-handed backhand reaching the semi-final of a Grand Slam in each calendar year. The streak had lasted since the majors began with the 1877 Wimbledon Championships.<\/p>\n
On Sunday night, in the stadium named after US tennis legend Arthur Ashe \u2013 he used a one-handed backhand \u2013 the sequence ended. Tsitsipas was beaten 6-2, 6-3, 6-4 by Ben Shelton in the fourth round of the US Open.<\/p>\n
The end of the 149-year streak should not come entirely as a surprise, as more players funneling into the upper echelons of tennis possess the steady two-handed backhand, instead of the flamboyant one-hander.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it is partly a consequence of the fact that, realistically, the two-handed backhand offers an advantage in modern tennis,\u201d Lorenzo Musetti, the former world No.5 who kept the streak alive at the US Open in 2024 and French Open last year, was quoted as saying by the US Open website.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn terms of efficiency, I think the two-handed backhand is more advantageous, especially in the modern game, with the speed at which tennis is played today.\u201d<\/p>\n
The sport has become slower because the overall speed of courts has been reduced and the tennis balls too have become heavier. This has caused rallies to become longer and reduced the tendency of players coming up to the net.<\/p>\n
With the slower speeds, the two-hander provides scope for a slightly bigger margin of error.<\/p>\n
\u201c(The one-hander) requires excellent footwork and technique,\u201d said Tsitsipas, a two-time Grand Slam finalist, after his second round at the US Open. \u201cThat is the only downside (compared to) a double-handed backhand.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like with a double-handed backhand you can always save the situation, if you\u2019re a bit late or out of position you can always use your left hand to sort of \u2018scoop\u2019 it in. There is no such thing with a one-handed backhand. If you\u2019re late, you\u2019re late. You missed the train.\u201d<\/p>\n
Once a staple and now an aberration, the one-handed backhand\u2019s decline has been steady across decades.<\/p>\n
In the 1969 calendar year, the first full season played in the Open Era, all four semi-finalists in each of the four majors used one-handers. In 2000, 14-time Grand Slam champion Pete Sampras was the only one-hander in the Australian Open semi-finals, Franco Squillari and Gustavo Kuerten reached the last four at the French Open, Sampras and Pat Rafter were semi-finalists at Wimbledon, and Sampras alone reached the last four in New York.<\/p>\n
This season, based on the current rankings, no top 10 ATP player uses a one-handed backhand. Going back to the US Open in 2006, four in the top 10 \u2013 Roger Federer, Ivan Ljubicic, Tommy Robredo and James Blake used the one-hander.<\/p>\n
Federer, a 20-time Grand Slam winner whose backhand has been revered for its balletic beauty and accuracy, had kept the streak alive for many years.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy coaches when I was growing up were, I would say, 90 percent one-handers,\u201d he said in a press conference during the US Open Fan Week. \u201cSo, I think when your coach is a one-handed tennis player, you will most likely be a one-handed tennis player too.<\/p>\n
\u201cNowadays, probably the coaches are mostly double-handed players, and it\u2019s just easier to teach a kid to have two hands on the backhand side.\u201d<\/p>\n
To tackle the changing speed of the courts, Federer in 2014 changed his racquet from a 90-square-inch frame to 97 inches, allowing him a bigger striking zone and the option to attack earlier.<\/p>\n
There are still a few who choose the one-hander. Rising star Lilli Tagger, an 18-year-old from Austria who won the junior French Open last year, was allowed to play with the one-handed backhand after she won a bet against her coach in the junior days.<\/p>\n
The world No.49 is now one of only four women\u2019s singles players in the top 100 using the one-hander \u2013 Diane Parry, Viktroija Golubic and Tatjana Maria are the others. Tagger now trains in an academy run by Francesca Schiavone, the last women\u2019s singles player to win a Grand Slam (French Open 2010) using the one-handed backhand.<\/p>\n
Among the men, the last player to win a Slam with the one-hander was Dominic Thiem in the 2020 US Open. There are six men in the top 100 using that stroke \u2013 Musetti, Tsitsipas, Denis Shapovalov, Daniel Altmaier, Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard and Aleksandar Kovacevic.<\/p>\n
When Swiss three-time Grand Slam winner Stan Wawrinka retires in a few months, there will no longer be an active major winner with a one-handed backhand.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou see, every single decade, we are degrading. We are like dinosaurs going extinct,\u201d Tsitsipas said.<\/p>\n
For those few hours on social media, #Keeponehanderalive was active. That movement though, seems to have come to a shuddering halt. Like the 149-year-old streak.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mumbai: On social media, a new campaign started after an appeal was made from the Grandstand stadium in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":883403,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,453150,453151,85,35899,747,453152,1751],"class_list":["post-883402","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-backhand","tag-one-handed-backhand","tag-sports","tag-stefanos-tsitsipas","tag-tennis","tag-two-handed-backhand","tag-us-open"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883402","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=883402"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/883402\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/883403"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=883402"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=883402"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=883402"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}