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Tennis scoring explained

Tennis / Popular

Games, sets, deuce and tie-breaks.

What coaches agree on

  • A game's score is called love (zero), 15, 30, and 40 as each player wins points - if both players reach 40, the score is called deuce.
  • A set goes to whoever is first to win six games, and a match goes to whoever takes the majority of sets - best of three in most play, best of five for men's Grand Slam singles.
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  • Once a set reaches six games all, it's decided by a tiebreak: the score switches to plain numbers (1, 2, 3...) and the first player to seven points wins the set.
  • The server's score is always said first, so a score like 30-15 means the server has two points to the receiver's one.

Common mistakes

  • It's natural to assume reaching the target number wins outright, but tennis requires a two-clear margin at every level - at deuce (40-40) you need two points in a row, and a set can't end 6-5, so play continues to 7-5 or goes to a tiebreak at 6-6.
Scoring system in tennis
Intermediate

Scoring system in tennis

Coach's take: Good idea, but the video confuses its own example -- shaky delivery.

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