Directional Intent?

The National Tennis Rating Program, which is used to determine the level of the League or Tournament in which players compete, uses the concept of DIRECTIONAL INTENT to describe mid-level participants. 

Those two words define a player's ability to place the ball out of the opponent's reach without making an error and giving away the point.

Low-level players think that the ball goes directly where you hit it. That, as higher-level players understand, is not completely true.

A sphere propelled in a particular direction may well begin its path directly toward its target, however, the influence of rotation, or lack of rotation (think knuckleball), will bend the flight path of that sphere moderately at low speed and quite dramatically at higher speeds.

The "MAGNUS FORCE" is the name for that invisible BENDER OF TRAJECTORY that is the curse of the average golfer and tennis player.

Higher-level players purposefully add rotation to almost all of their shots to shape their ball flight and improve directional intent!

Unless and until a player adds the ability to produce purposeful rotation on nearly every shot, they are pretty much doomed to competing at the lower levels of the sport.

Learn the swing paths that produce certain ball flight behaviors, then practice those swings until you can conjure them up under pressure, and you'll be a higher-level player for your efforts.

A racket face is a multi-purpose tool that, in the hand of a skilled player, cannot just hit but wipe, brush, and drag across the ball in various directions to produce safer margins for error for the hitter and nasty bounces for the opponent.

Remember that hitting with "DIRECTIONAL INTENT" demands the knowledge of how a spinning ball behaves, so spend some time building those racket skills!