Doubles return of serve: the position that unlocks the point

The serving team on the ATP tour wins three of every four first-serve points in professional doubles. The specific number across the 2024, 2025 and 2026 seasons is 75 per cent, with the comparable figure on second serves at 62.6 per cent before double faults are added back in. On the WTA tour the equivalent numbers are 61.9 and 52.4. The data comes from Will Boucek, a working ATP and WTA doubles strategy analyst, published on Tennis Tribe in June 2026 from a dataset of thousands of charted serves across both tours.

Breaking serve in doubles is harder than in singles. The serving team often has two players at the net before the return has been struck. Which is also why professional doubles matches so routinely go to tiebreaks and super-tiebreaks: breaking at this level is hard.

The counterpoint for the pros and the rest of us is that the teams in the hunt at the end of a season are winning most of their matches with the return rather than the serve. Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos defended Roland Garros in June and have won three Grand Slam titles across the last five majors, playing a style built on consistent returning more than on holding with first-serve power. By the standards of the tour’s biggest servers they are an unspectacular serving team. On the return they are the most consistent pair in the game by some distance.

So the return is the leverage point. Which raises the question of what a good return actually looks like.

Where you stand

There are three positions a doubles returner can take, and they differ by only a few steps from the baseline.

The default is standard baseline: on the line, in a short split, meeting the ball at the top of its bounce. Most tour returns against a mid-pace first serve are hit from here. It trades a split-second of reaction time against a bigger first serve for the ability to drive the return back with weight and depth.

Against a big server, the returner steps back one to three paces. That extra time means the ball drops lower into the strike zone and the swing has more room to develop. The cost is that the returner is further from the net and the response is more defensive. The server’s partner at the net can now cut off the cross-court angle more aggressively, because the return is coming from further away and will have to climb.

The third option is a step or two inside the baseline, which in modern tennis means chip-and-charge to the net so that the returning team are both at the net for the third shot of the rally. The modern first serve is too big for this to be a default against any top-level server but it's very effective in club matches against a moderate first server. On the second serve, it is always a weapon to consider using. A handful of current touring players will selectively charge the second serve, usually off a block or chip to the net player’s feet. And at club level, where second serves are not kicking at 100mph, this is an option to start trying in your local league doubles ladder.

None of these three positions is correct in isolation. They are reactive. A returner should stand where the server’s weakest ball will land. For a club player playing someone with a hard flat first serve and a slow kick second, that means standing back on first and stepping in on second. For a player facing a server with equal pace on both deliveries, standard baseline on both is probably right.

Where your partner stands

The returner’s partner has two options.

Standard position puts them on the service line, splitting the difference between a volley and defending a lob or a rocketed return that comes back through them. This is the default on tour and the default at any club above the beginner level. (More on where you should actually be standing in doubles here.)

The second option is called 2-back, with the returner’s partner retreating to the baseline next to the returner. The Bryan brothers built a career on this against the biggest-serving teams of their era. Mike Bryan was explicit that the move was designed to neutralise servers trying to pick off a weak return with the net player’s volley: with both receivers back, the serving team’s net player has nothing to attack and has to volley the return into a two-player defence (although watch for net players who are master drop volleyers or acute angle volleyers).

2-back is now less of a default on the men’s tour than it was in the Bryans’ era and more of a reactive position used against I-formation, Australian formation, and body-serving specialists. On the women’s tour and at junior-pro level it still appears regularly. At club level, 2-back is the single most-underused position in the amateur game, because it dramatically reduces the number of points the serving team can win cheaply at the net.

A quick rule of thumb for club players: if your returns are regularly getting put away by the server’s net partner, go 2-back for a game. The miss rate on your returns will go down, the number of volley winners against you will go down, and the server now has to actually hit a good serve to win the point.

How to counter what the server is doing

The server’s partner has two formations that change what the returner can hit.

The I-formation puts the net player crouched on the centre service line, then breaks one way or the other after the serve. The purpose is to get the returner’s eye off the ball and introduce indecision about whether the cross-court corridor is open or closed. The counter at tour level is to return low and short through the service box regardless of where the net player ends up breaking. A low ball through the service line forces the net player to half-volley from the deuce or ad box depending on which way they went, and the half-volley will often sit up. Occasionally a drive at the net player’s hip or feet produces an outright error. Trying to pick the direction the net player will break is usually a losing game, unless they move extremely early.

The Australian formation puts the server’s partner on the same side of the court as the server, closing the cross-court lane and daring the returner to go down the line. The returner has three high-value counters. A sharp dipper cross-court when the net player over-commits to covering the line. A hard drive straight at the net player’s body. And a lob over the net player’s head, which is particularly effective in Australian formation because the server has to run around to cover the open court and will usually arrive late. (More on when the Australian formation wins.)

The four returns

A doubles returner has four shots available. Each one has a specific right context.

The block return is the default against a first serve. Short backswing, meet the ball out in front, aim low and cross-court through the service box. The ball needs to pass over the net at a height that forces the server’s partner to volley up rather than down. The block aims for a reply the serving team has to volley defensively, which puts the ball back in a 50-50 rally. A winner off the block is a bonus, not the goal.

The chip return is the default against a mid-pace second serve, hit with slice to keep the ball low and dying. On the backhand side it uses the same continental-grip slice motion a player would hit a slice backhand with in singles. The chip is both a neutralising shot in its own right and the setup for a chip-and-charge, where the chipper follows the shot into the net.

The drive return is the aggressive second-serve response. Full topspin swing, cross-court or down the line, aiming for a dipping ball at the net player’s feet. Granollers, Zeballos and Vavassori will all drive mid-pace second serves aggressively off both wings. The risk is that if the drive sits up at all, the serving team’s net player gets a volley-winner on a sitting ball. The reward is that if the drive lands at the feet of the net player, the point tilts hard the returner’s way.

The lob return is for second serves, Australian formation, and against net players who are poaching aggressively. Chip or topspin, over the net player’s shoulder. The lob is the most reliable way to reset a point in which the serving team has set up for a short, aggressive first exchange. Bob Bryan’s backhand punch lob down the line was one of his most effective return shots across his career because he could control both trajectory and depth. At club level, where overheads are rarely as reliable as they are on tour, the lob return is even more valuable.

The pattern the professionals follow

The highest-returning teams on the ATP tour do not go for winners on the return. Patrick McEnroe, the long-time ESPN doubles commentator and former United States Davis Cup captain, stated the obvious (but often forgotten in the heat of the moment) rule when he said that: “rule number one on break points is make sure you get the return back into play.” The pros who are consistently breaking the biggest servers on tour are following the McEnroe rule and keeping the ball low, deep and bothersome rather than looking for the one perfect strike.

The ATP’s own feature profile of Soares described him as the player who led the tour in consistent returning: “very good at holding the ball and making opponents move, and then going in the other direction.” The sequence matters: hold the ball first, make the opponents move second, change direction third. The returner who tries to do all three on the first shot usually ends the point in the net.

What to carry onto the court

If you take one thing onto your next doubles court, let it be the return positions. Stand back against big servers. Step in on second serves. Go 2-back if the server’s partner is beating you with volleys at the net. Return low and cross-court through the service box as the default, and lob over Australian formation. Hit the drive only when the second serve gives you a ball you can swing freely at.

The serving team wins three of every four first-serve points at ATP tour level. Any club pair that can tilt their own return percentage up by a few points from where it sits now will break substantially more often. The return of serve is where that number moves.