Objective: Modern tennis performance increasingly depends on the integration of perceptual-cognitive and movement-related abilities due to the highly dynamic and unpredictable nature of competitive match play. Although combined cognitive-motor training (CCMT) has gained increasing attention in open-skill sports, evidence regarding its effectiveness in competitive tennis remains limited. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the effects of CCMT on reactive agility, decision-making ability, and match performance in competitive tennis players.
Materials and Methods: An assessor-blinded randomized controlled trial with a parallel-group pretest–posttest design was conducted involving 40 competitive tennis players aged 16–22 years. Participants were randomized into experimental (n = 20) and control groups (n = 20). Following two non-intervention-related withdrawals in the control group, final per-protocol analyses included 38 participants. The experimental group performed combined cognitive-motor training integrated within the regular training schedule for eight weeks, whereas the control group performed regular tennis training only. Reactive agility, tennis-specific decision-making, and match performance were evaluated before and after the intervention period. Data were analyzed using a linear mixed model (p < 0.05).
Findings: The experimental group demonstrated significantly greater improvements in reactive agility performance compared with the control group (F = 18.72, p ≤ 0.001). Significant group × time interaction effects were also identified for decision-making accuracy (F = 16.94, p ≤ 0.001) and response time (F = 14.27, p ≤ 0.001). In addition, the experimental group exhibited greater improvements in match-performance indicators, including winners (F = 11.83, p = 0.002), unforced errors (F = 13.26, p = 0.001), rally success percentage (F = 15.11, p ≤ 0.001), point-winning efficiency (F = 13.02, p = 0.001), and tactical efficiency index (F = 12.48, p = 0.001). No serious adverse events or intervention-related injuries were reported during the intervention period.
Conclusions: Combined cognitive-motor training produced greater improvements in reactive agility, tennis-specific decision-making performance, and competitive match outcomes compared with regular tennis training alone. These findings suggest that integrating cognitive challenges within representative sport-specific movement tasks may provide an effective strategy for enhancing perceptual-cognitive and movement-related performance capacities in competitive tennis players. Future studies should investigate long-term retention effects and explore the underlying mechanisms associated with cognitive-motor adaptation in sport-specific training environments.