Momentum in tennis is the sense that the balance of power in a match is with one player or doubles team. It shifts when a gap opens or closes between the two players’ performance levels, often after a turning point such as a saved break point, a contentious line call or a spectacular winner. To stop a momentum shift against you, slow down, go back to your between-point routine, breathe, stay in the present, and decide whether to tighten up or play more freely.
This article is adapted from Momentum: The Winning Edge in Tennis by former LTA National Coach Alistair Higham and sport psychologist Dr Ana Soares.
It’s 6-1, 4-2 and you’re coasting. Twenty-five minutes later it’s 6-1, 4-6, 1-5, and nothing is working. Your technique hasn’t changed. There’s no injury. What has changed is momentum – the hidden force that shapes every tennis match, and the one most players never learn to manage.
What Is Momentum in Tennis?
When commentators say a player “has momentum”, they mean the balance of power in the match is with that player or team. Once a player starts to gain momentum, it can build on itself and things get better and better; once a player starts to lose it, things can get worse and worse. Researchers describe positive momentum as an upward spiral in which everything seems to go well, and negative momentum as a downward spiral in which everything seems to go wrong.
Momentum is not magic, and it isn’t luck. There is a clear link between momentum and performance: it changes when a gap opens between the two players’ levels, or closes as one player makes a comeback. When both players’ levels change at once – one rising, the other dropping – you get a dramatic shift, and the effect can spiral.
Why Does Momentum Shift in Tennis?
Momentum often changes direction after a turning point – a match event that changes the flow of the match. Common examples include an outstanding winner, a contentious line call, saved break or match points, a missed easy shot, or a medical or toilet break.
Tennis is especially prone to momentum swings because of its scoring system. Points, games and sets are scored in independent blocks, so the score doesn’t always reflect the state of play, not every point carries equal weight, and there’s no clock to run down. A player who is behind can always find a way back – and a player who is ahead can always lose their way.
Crucially, a potential turning point only becomes a real one if a player responds badly to it. Your response decides whether a surge of momentum follows.
How Do You Know Momentum Is Against You?
In interviews, professional players and coaches described it like this:
- You feel unsettled and nothing seems to be working.
- Your opponent is controlling things, even though you’re still trying hard.
- Your legs feel leaden and your movement doesn’t flow.
- You mis-time the ball, and the ball and the court seem small.
- Unlucky things seem to happen, and small things get on your nerves.
How to Stop a Momentum Shift in Tennis: 6 Strategies
These strategies come from Dr Ana Soares’s research into the psychology of turning points, based on interviews with professional players, and from the authors’ work with GB international and world-ranked players.
1. Slow down
When momentum turns, most players want to rush to get back to where they were. But when momentum is against you, things don’t go your way, so taking your time is usually better. The fastest way back into a match is often slowly – at least for a period. Slowing things down gives you time to reset and can break your opponent’s rhythm.
2. Go back to your between-point routine
Returning to a between-point routine was one of the most common responses professional players described after a potential negative turning point. A good routine can carry other mental skills, such as breathing, positive self-talk and visualisation.
3. Use your breathing to reset
Breathing was frequently mentioned by players as an effective way to stop a setback turning into a slide. Slow, controlled breathing helps you calm down and think clearly about what to do next.
4. Stay in the present
It’s easy to get stuck on what has just happened – the missed match point, the bad call – or on what might happen next. As one professional player put it, the more you learn to accept turning points and be in the present moment, the greater the chance you have of winning. Thoughts like “I should be winning this” tend to make things worse.
5. Decide: adjust, or change tactics?
Take a problem-solving approach. If your game plan is very close to working and you’re just missing shots you wouldn’t normally miss, stay with it and make small adjustments. If your opponent seems to “have your number”, consider a change – for the rest of the match, or just until the dynamic shifts. Players typically go one of two ways: aiming for greater consistency to regain control (“make more balls, focus on first serve and the next shot”), or playing more freely and aggressively, with bigger margins.
6. Look for small wins – and show them
Players describe looking for small victories and celebrating them outwardly, and maintaining a “fighter image”. After a positive moment while behind, some players deliberately raise their energy and body language, signalling to themselves and their opponent that this is now a different match.
How to Keep Momentum When It’s With You
When things are going your way, professional players talk about “maintaining the same approach”: keeping the same between-point routine and playing one point at a time. Tactically, the message is to press home your advantage rather than sit on a lead. One professional warned against serving well and attacking the net to get ahead, then starting to loop the ball in and hope the opponent misses. Players also mention giving the opponent less time between points and being “prepared to fight when ahead”. Don’t show them a way back.
A Wimbledon Turnaround
Former Davis Cup player Luke Milligan led former world number 6 Nicolas Lapentti by two sets at Wimbledon and held two match points – then lost the third and fourth sets on tiebreaks, cramping and drained. At the start of the fifth, he noticed that Lapentti had also called the trainer. That small observation gave him a route to victory: he decided to play aggressively and with freedom, keeping his own movement to a minimum and making his opponent run. He won the fifth set 6-1, nearly two hours after his first match point. The turning point wasn’t a shot – it was how he responded.
Master the Journey of the Match
In Momentum: The Winning Edge in Tennis, Alistair Higham and Dr Ana Soares set out a complete framework for managing match flow – the phases of a match, how the scoring system creates turning points, tactical game management and mental skills – with worksheets and matchplay practices for players and coaches at every level.