There is a moment in almost every rally where you sense the door is open. Your opponents send back a slightly high ball, or one of them is caught out of position, and something in you says go. So you push forward, take an extra step or two toward the kitchen line, and try to close down the court. Sometimes it works beautifully and you finish the point. Other times you get lobbed over your head, or the ball comes back at your feet while you are still moving, and the space you tried to take ends up costing you the point instead.
That second outcome is why a lot of players stop trusting their instinct to move up. They decide taking space is risky, so they hang back and wait, then wonder why better teams keep controlling the net against them. The problem is not that moving forward is dangerous. It is that most of us move forward at the wrong moments, in the wrong way, and without a plan for the ball that comes back. Taking space is one of the most valuable things you can do in doubles, but it has to be earned rather than grabbed.
The kitchen, for anyone newer to the terms, is the non-volley zone, the seven-foot area on each side of the net where you cannot hit the ball out of the air. Owning the line at the front of that zone is where most doubles points are won, and the whole game is a quiet negotiation over who gets to stand there comfortably. Here are three ways to win that negotiation without getting burned.
1. Take Space Behind Your Own Good Shot, Not in Front of a Loose One
The safest time to move forward is right after you have hit a ball that gives your opponents a genuine problem. When your shot lands low and forces them to hit up, they cannot attack you while you advance, which means you can close ground during the exact window when they are least able to punish you.
This is the cause-and-effect chain worth burning into memory. A good low ball limits their options, their limited options give you time, and that time is what lets you move safely. Reverse it and the danger becomes obvious. If you move forward behind a ball that sits up, you are advancing straight into the moment your opponents are most able to drive it at you or past you. You have given them a target that is closer, moving, and not yet set.
Picture a third-shot drop that lands soft in the kitchen and pulls your opponent into a gentle upward dink. That is your invitation. You take two controlled steps in while they are reaching down for a ball they cannot attack. Now picture the opposite: your drop floats a little high, and you move up anyway out of habit. They take it out of the air and aim at your shoelaces while your weight is still going forward. Same instinct to advance, completely different result, and the only thing that changed was the quality of the ball you moved behind.
The lesson is to let your shot decide your feet. Move up when you have made the ball hard to attack. Hold your ground when you have not.
2. Take Half the Space, Not All of It
The single most common way players get burned is by trying to travel too far, too fast. They are at the baseline, they see a decent ball, and they try to sprint all the way to the kitchen line in one go. The trouble is that you are most vulnerable while you are moving. A ball that arrives while your feet are still traveling is far harder to handle than one that arrives while you are stopped and balanced.
This is where the transition zone earns its bad reputation. The transition zone is the stretch of court between the baseline and the kitchen line, sometimes called no-man’s-land, and it feels awkward precisely because balls tend to land at your feet there. But it is not a place to avoid. It is a place to move through in stages. Rather than trying to cover the whole distance behind one shot, take part of the space, stop, split-step, and read the next ball before you take the rest.
A split step is the small hop that lands you balanced and ready just as your opponent strikes the ball. It is what lets you change direction or absorb a ball at your feet instead of getting caught flat-footed mid-stride. If you close half the distance behind a good drop, split-step as they make contact, reset the next ball if it comes at your feet, and then close the rest of the way behind that reset, you have taken all the same ground without ever being the moving target that gets picked off.
A useful self-check while you are learning this: if you keep getting jammed by balls at your feet, you are almost certainly trying to cover too much ground in a single move. Shorten the trip. Two calm advances beat one hopeful sprint.
3. Respect the Space Behind You So the Lob Can’t Punish You
The third way to take space safely is to remember that closing the net creates a weakness behind you, and to manage it before your opponents exploit it. Every step you take toward the kitchen line opens up more room over your head, and against opponents who like to lob, charging all the way to the line and staying glued there is an open invitation to put the ball behind you.
The answer is not to stop taking the net. It is to hold your forward position with a little awareness rather than a lot of commitment. Set up close enough to the line to be effective, but keep your weight balanced rather than leaning forward onto your toes, so you can still push back for a lob without falling over. If a team has already shown they will lob, hold a step or two off the line, ready to move up on a ball you can attack, instead of camping on the line and getting beaten over the top.
Taking space in doubles is also a two-person job. If your partner gets pulled wide and a lob goes up over the open side, the player with the best angle takes it and the other slides across to cover. When both players understand that the space behind is shared, one lob stops being a guaranteed point and becomes just another ball to run down.
Drill: Earn the Line
This drill trains the whole idea, moving forward only when the ball allows it and advancing in stages rather than one rush.
Setup
- Four players, normal doubles positions. One team starts at the kitchen line; the other starts at the baseline.
- The baseline team’s job is to work their way forward and take the line.
- The kitchen team feeds a ball to start each rally and then plays the point out, but they are allowed to lob.
Rules
- The baseline team may only move forward behind a ball they have hit low or into the kitchen. If they advance behind a ball that sits up, they must step back to where they started and try again.
- They must advance in no more than half-court stages, with a visible split step each time before taking more ground.
- The kitchen team is encouraged to lob whenever the advancing team is leaning too far forward or has left the back open.
- Play to 7. Rotate which team starts back.
Focus On
- Letting the quality of your last shot decide whether your feet move.
- Splitting to a balanced stop before you take the next chunk of space.
- Keeping enough of a base that you can still turn and chase a lob.
- Talking with your partner about who covers the ball over the top.
A simple self-check runs through the whole drill. If you are getting lobbed, you are closing too greedily or leaning too far forward. If you are getting jammed at the feet, you are moving too far in one go. If you are winning the line and holding it, you are taking space the way it is meant to be taken.
Space at the net is not something you grab in a single burst of enthusiasm. It is something you earn one good ball at a time, close in controlled stages, and hold with enough balance that the court behind you never becomes the thing that beats you. Move up when your shot has bought you the right to, and the net stops being a gamble and starts being yours.
