The serve is the only stroke you have the ball in your hand and complete control (?!). Ideally you want to make the serve as long as possible. The reason for this is that the receiving side will want to get to the NVZ line as fast as possible in order to dominate the rally. The receiver’s partner should already be at the NVZ line and the receiver wants to join them immediately if possible. The deeper your serve the longer it will take the receiver to move up the court to the NVZ. If they are a bit slow getting there they will be in no man’s land so you can play the ball back to their feet as they are on the move. This can be an easy point or at least provoke a weak shot and allow you and your partner to move up and take the initiative. So practise hitting long serves. In a friendly game you could agree to allow a second serve if the first serve goes out to help practise the long serve. The serve can be, more than just getting the rally going!