Poly Ball First Impressions

The LTTA purchased and tested out two ITTF approved Poly balls the other day.


JOOLA Super-P 3-Star Poly Ball and Donic 40+ 3-Star Poly Ball. Both balls are with seams.

The balls were purchased from megaspin.net with the Joola balls being on sale bringing them within the price range of the Donic balls. Of every club member asked, they could not tell the difference between the two balls making the cheaper Donic ball appear to be a winner. I can tell you personally that while I could tell slight differences in the poly ball compared to the celluloid ball, more on that in a minute, I could not tell a single difference between the two balls. They are that similar.

Poly vs Celluloid

I have recorded practice play, matches & club member interviews that I will be posting on this blog within the next couple of days to see how the new ball behaves. Seeing is believing correct?

In the meantime, here is the gist of popular opinions from the club members if you can't wait until that point.

The new balls is indeed harder.
This was the biggest difference I saw the entire night between the new poly ball and the celluloid balls. It takes a substantial amount of more pressure to squeeze the ball with your thumb enough to make the ball flex or give. Does this mean a truer flight path and bounce? Possibly. Does this mean the ball is more susceptible to breaking because it has less give to it? Perhaps. However in 3+ hours of play with virtually every club member hitting and playing games with the new balls, we did not have a single broken ball.

The spin appears to be slightly down
Some of our heavier spin players noticed where they had shots that would normally land, tended to go just off the table. This opinion seems consistent with popular belief that the new ball is indeed less spiny than the current celluloid ball. Having said that, to a man all our spin based players felt the ball wasn't that bad and they just needed a little time to adjust.

From a personal observation, in watching my spin based doubles partner Ben play, later in the night he was landing the same shots I typically see him land during normal play. I, as a short pips player, did not notice much a change in spin at all. I did however feel as though hitting hard for speed and smashing was slightly easier with the new ball. The speed on those shots was very good.

Blocking is easier
I personally can attest to this. Not to say that I cannot, or will not, have blocks where my inverted opponent out spins me and I block it long anymore. That still can happen and did last night. It is simply to say the percentage of times where that will happen has gone slightly to moderately down. Several club members agreed that blocking is easier.

That's it for now for the opinions that were universally shared among the players.

My personal opinion on the new Poly Ball.

A lot of fuss has been made over nothing. The differences between this ball and the old celluloid ball are very small. This is like the guy who gets his hair cut once a week to keep things in line. There's something slightly different there but you're not quite sure what it is. Queue suspicious look.

Is the ball different? Yes. There is something about the feel of it that is hard to point point. However with a new ball, how could this not be expected. Having said that, the feel different is so minuscule, that after a month of playing with the ball, perhaps even shorter, I doubt I would be able to remember what the old ball felt like at all. I think that new poly ball will become the new normal in no time flat once players begging playing with it exclusively.


Check back here soon for video of their full impressions and play.