someone on twt asked for royal trio tennis playing styles so i will think out loud for several paragraphs under the cut:
GORO AKECHI. the son of masayoshi shido, one of the best players of all time, so he has big shoes to fill. however he didn't learn from shido himself and was instead passed around various intl academies before settling in at shujin tennis academy.
as a lefty he uses it to his advantage: his spin serve is killer and he's a menace with backhand slices and drop shots. he's not one to rush the net and only cleans up with volleys if his opponent is basically off the court already.
though not PATIENT by any means, he's very very consistent and i think he seeks to wear you down quickly at the beginning of the match: you get the feeling that "oh shit this guy's an absolute wall, i can't counter this, it's hopeless" so that he can rake in the games from there. i think you have to go into a match with REALLY high confidence otherwise he'll break you pretty fast
he also does passive aggressive mind games i.e. instead of passing u the ball to serve he hits em to the corner so u have to go fetch them. doing quick water breaks or none at all if he's winning so you're forced to rush. asking "are you sure?" on linecalls where it was DEFINITELY out just to make you second-guess yourself. he doesn't cheat, though, obviously,that's leagues beneath him, but he'll do little things to break your concentration in a match
so there's already a high bar to vault over if u even want a CHANCE at beating goro akechi, but if you get on his nerves somehow then you can crack him from there. someone like akira's unpredictability and flippantness on the court without much sense of planning probably gets under his skin really quick
AKIRA KURUSU. wildcard....... he played a lot of sports growing up, baseball, soccer, track, basketball, u name it basically, but picked up tennis at around age 13 and Somehow was extremely good at it, and immediately scouted and currently training at shujin tennis academy.
his athletic and naturally competitive nature means he's naturally really attuned to the nature of Competitive Sport: aka, if he's down, no big deal he'll just fight like hell to get back up. one of the things in tennis is that u can spiral real easily: losing a few points can turn into losing a few games then the match, however, that doesn't phase akira which is his biggest strength. he's really good at Wiping The Slate Clean and starting from scratch if he's down.
he's really good at swapping strategies: he can be the moonballer, he can be the 25-ball-rallier, he can be the serve-and-volley menace. etc. and he can do this on the fly without any reluctance.
the biggest thing apart from goro and sumi is that he's having FUN. he loves being on the court no matter what, the competition part is secondhand. meanwhile goro and sumi are really really wrapped up in their issues with tennis so the kinda Mind emptiness akira has puts him a step ahead (which they're envious of slash HOW DOES HE DO IT? slash working towards it)
SO YEAH hes highly adaptable and fluid in his game style. though, ofc, he tends towards Flashier stuff (which can easily surprise his opponents) so i'd say he's a big fan of cross-cross-down-the-line and such patterns. deep rallies then sudden drop shot and while ur scrambling he beats u to the net. stuff like that. second serve on the first serve. etc.
another thing is that his parents are pretty absent (different than the way goro is) i.e. they just dgaf about him entirely, no matter what he does, even if hes good at tennis. (while w goro at least shido would acknowledge him since shido is so far in the limelight). so i think this adds to his adaptability - he doesn't feel constrained the same way goro and sumi do, by their family relationships
akira's also one to chat up his opponent mid match LMAO he's not even trying to distract them or play them like that but he's just a friendly happy go lucky guy
in the end his thinking is "i hate to lose" so he just keeps playing and keeps winning. it's simple like that
SUMIRE YOSHIZAWA. younger sister of kasumi, she started rhythmic gymnastics w her at a baby age but even from a young age she could tell kasumi was going to outshine her. because of her own timidness holding her back, her own reverence of her sister, she could tell she'd never truly have the willpower/confidence/steadfastness to reach out and be Better than kasumi. because what she really wants is to imprint her name on the world - she doesn't want to be yknow. "kasumi and sumire" she wants to stand on her own, something she doesn't feel she can do if she keeps on with gymnastics.
SO SHE SWITCHES TRACKS TO TENNIS another independent sort of sport where you're also scrutinized in the limelight and etc. it'd be difficult to learn this late in the game (age 11ish maybe.) but she's steeled herself and shes determined and READY. it was a biiig decision for her but her parents+kasumi were basically like ok <3 yay<3 and she doesnt reveal how insecure she was about all of that and living in kasumi's shadow and etc. she only confides in akira abt this later down the line (and then goro)
her game is really like yknow textbook GOOD like all her shots are impeccable and perfect and really technically perfect. super impressive all around. i dont think she has any specific shots/plays that make her stand out, but her game speaks for itself already in how consistent she is and how steadfast she seems on the court (though inside she's lowk nervous)
i think her game might be "predictable" just because of how pristine and mechanically she learned it, but the thing is her form and aim is just so flawless that even if you do know whats coming next you cant counter it all the time
actually if anything i think she'd have a killer fast first serve. like CRAZY powerful
i think she's not naturally "good" at tennis the way akira and goro are so she works 10x as hard to remedy it. more than just the physical/technical component, getting her mental right is the hard and most important part. when she gets deep into a match sometimes her brain gets the better of her, so in longlong matches she oftentimes loses so that's the current thing she's working on.
as with pro tennis comes PUBLICITY and BRAND DEALS and INTERVIEWS and MODELING and ETC
goro dgaf about that but if he's more Famous then he'd be more shoved into shido's face so he goes along with sponsorships and interviews and magazine covers even tho he lowkey hates it.
He doesn't do the detective prince thing here bc he doesn't need to be. he's outwardly bitter and pissed off and snappy the way we know him
akira and sumi are his biggest fans tho always collecting his brand deals and magazines and stuff. they also help tutor him in english so he can do interviews better LMAOO though he's really eyeroll about it
akira and sumi both are good with the publicicty aspect as opposed to goro. sumi, striving to become an intl star, expects it and trains herself for it in spite of her social anxieties. akira, well, is akira and is totally made for the limelight
this causes some sort of internal distress? in goro. he can't quite place it but he feels strange standing alongside them..... something like that. like, of course he wants to take the tennis world by storm, but in the way that he can rub it in shidos face. not really this... aspect? he's not sure what to do with this.
sumi and goro are both highly superstitious and have a solid routine that they ALWAYS adhere to. i.e. goro always practices vs the ball machine the night before. sumi always rewatches rio iwasaki's killer 2016 matchpoint before matches. sumi never wears tennis shoes anywhere other than the court. goro never drinks other gatorade colors besides yellow.
meanwhile u could call akira up 3 mins before and be like hey matchtime and he'd be like ok<3 yay<3
sumi and goro also both analyze their opponents before matches i.e. looking up their ranking and stats and extrapolating stuff frm there while akira is like "oh narukami? from uhhhh. gekkoukan? no. yasogami? ohhh haha thats fun i dont think i played him before :3"
to me at least sumi doesn't come off as naturally competitive the way akira and goro are, inherently: i think she wants to be GOOD, and maybe (in this au) she wants to be Better than kasumi, to gain recognition, to stand on her own two feet: etc. but maybe she doesnt have the inherent Means to get there so that's a lot of what she gains from being friends with akira and goro, to get insight into their mindsets
akira and goro are doubles partners (for better or for worse) (it works great some days and horribly the next. you never know) they dont Seriously compete in doubles though, theyre both singles players to the end.
akira and goro switch off being sumi's mixed doubles partners. she doesn't really play doubles at all i think
sumi is the one who watches pro tennis the most. goro and akira don't really keep up
they all go to shujin academy but kinda half-homeschooled bc as pro players they dont have time for full-time school. theyre also traveling a lot so yeah
goro ties his hair in a low ponytail on the court, sometimes pins his bangs back. akira's hair is too short to tie back, i imagine he pins it back or wears a headband a la rafael nadal
sumi wears a visor! and contacts. akira wears contacts too but sometimes he wears glasses when hes silly goofy
mishima is a sports reporter LMAOOO well theyre all highschool age here so he's a Wannabe sports reporter.
it's also common knowledge that goro is shido's son btw. and goro's mom is dead also. i think only akira and sumi know abt like. his hatred and resentment towards his dad tho
ALSO they all idolize rio iwasaki bc i said so. shes prob like the coolest tennis player of the decade and also woah shes from gekkoukan thats cRAZYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!! hamuko is her wife too. tennis coach ham:3 or smth
i think akira's story is then catalyzed later down the line by an injury - that he can heal from, but it forces him to seriously look at tennis and say for certain "ok this is my dream and this is something i want to devote my life to" the way sumi and goro are already devoted to
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