mjamja wrote: His demonstration stroke finished with racket tip pointing forward. Your stroke kept finishing with the tip pointing to the side. This normally indicates using to much upper arm to move racket forward. Instead use the forearm to move the racket so it kind of pivots around the elbow while the elbow stays almost stationary. Using the upper arm as the forward driver may be why it was hard for you to relax your shoulder.

And my 2 cents worth is very similar.  If you look at your backhand stroke, it's all delivered using shoulder and upper arm.  Rather than your swing rotating around your elbow, you're lifting it, and your bat really doesn't swing at all.

Starting point (ball bouncing off table):

Point of contact:

End of swing:

Can you see that the majority of movement is in lifting your elbow?  And your bat angle remains parallel to the table throughout.

Purely for comparative purposes, here is Australia's best backhand ever:

Start of swing:

Point of contact:

End of swing (almost!):

Comparing the first two shots, you'll see that Henzell's elbow has very, very little upwards motion.  As he hits the ball, his elbow is still almost at table height.  As his arm begins to pivot around his elbow, the bat is moving forwards.  In the final shot, his elbow is higher, but that is the result of his follow through.  And, as Mark pointed out, the bat is now pointing forward.

I trust that you had a good coaching session with him. He's a literal perfectionist in the best possible way.

For being one of his students, you can definitely count yourself as being one of the lucky ones!

Upon my reflection during the coaching years, he has had a profound impact in shaping not only my table tennis but also as a person. So many wonderful attributes were passed on to me. I knew this at the time but now that he is not readily available, it means so much more.

If you are still in the area please say hi to him for me.

Thanks for sharing the clip! Nostalgia is definitely kicking in!