ATP Tennis Radio Podcast

Hailing from South Africa, sometimes to be found in South Korea, Neville Godwin joined us to talk about coaching one of the most promising players on tour, Hyeon Chung. In this wide-ranging chat we touched on his coaching philosophy, his time previously with fellow South African Kevin Anderson, Chung’s biggest achievements so far, including a Grand Slam semi-final and his time out through injury.

Former World Number 2 and French Open finalist, Magnus Norman joins us for a chat. Magnus is also now the coach of Stan Wawrinka and we spoke all about Stan and the Grand Slam successes he’s had while they’ve been together, their relationship on and off the court and the Magnus Norman coaching philosophy, but we started with round 2 of the ATP Coaches Programme, basically an incredible auction of promises raising funds for fellow coaches struggling during the pandemic, and one of the lots up for grabs is a session with Magnus himself.

We're joined by a man with 6 ATP tour titles to his name and two tantalising Grand Slam finals. He’s reached a career-high world number 5, from South Africa now at home in the United States, this is of course, Kevin Anderson. Kevin joined us on the line and we touched on all of that and more, including an injury-plagued 18 months or so and to start with, whether lock down had at least given him a little more time to recover.

Milos Raonic speak to ATP Tennis Radio presenter Seb Lauzier about a number of topics including returning to competitive play in August, getting the balance between fitness and tennis practice right during lockdown, his early life and moving to Canada, his breakthrough year in 2011, his Wimbledon final in 2016, reaching a career-high number 3 in the rankings and his future goals.

We focus on some of the stars of NextGen tennis - past, present and possibly future - all set for big things once the action gets back underway in August. The first of the grand slams we have to look forward to is the US Open and we feature a young Russian who made the quarter finals as a teenager at Flushing Meadows. Back from his recent injury problems, Andrey Rublev was on the tear with two titles already this year before the Coronavirus halted his progress to a career-high 14th in the FedEx ATP Rankings. With three titles last year and a semi-final at the first ATP Cup in Australia, we put 21-year-old Alex De Minaur under the spotlight. Like Alex De Minaur, Denis Shapovalov started the year at the ATP Cup in Australia, before moving onto Auckland, the Australian Open, Montpellier, Rotterdam and then his final tournament before the break, a quarter-final appearance in Marseille. Maybe the packed schedule is down to a new coach, known in his playing days as workhorse. We hear from both Shapovalov and Mikhail Youzhny. Jumping across to hear what social media show Tennis United has been up to, we bring you their chat with two-time Grand Slam Champion Naomi Osaka and the reigning Nitto ATP Finals champion, young Greek Stefanos Tsitsipas. Finally, we take a detailed look at the stunning backhand of young Italian, Jannick Sinner, courtesy of Infosys and drop down to the Challenger Tour to find out a little bit more about hot prospects, Brazilian Thiago Seyboth Wild and Austrian, Jurij Rodionov.

Former US Open Champion Marin Cilic joins Seb Lauzier to look back over his career highs and lows as well as discussing the work he's been doing with his foundation during lockdown. They speak about getting into tennis at an early age, memories of his first tour win and title, winning the US Open and reaching the finals of Wimbledon and the US Open, plus his other career highs including two Queens titles, his first Masters 1000 victory in Cincinnati, reaching the Tour Finals on multiple occasions and claiming victory in the Davis Cup. He also talks about working with Goran Ivanisevic, Jonas Bjorkman, Ivan Cinkus and Wayne Ferreira and how current coach Vedran Martic might look to curb the amount of times he bounces the ball before serving. We also get a glimpse into what life feels like at home with a newborn and how Marin sees the remainder of his career and what he wants to do in the future.

The current coach of Stan Wawrinka and Karolina Pliskova talks about a number of subjects, including working with his current charges, coaching the likes of Andy Murray and Grigor Dimitrov and what's he's learnt from fellow coaches Magnus Norman and Ivan Lendl. He also talks about the best and worst advice he's ever given a player, growing up with Andy Murray at the Sanchez-Casal Academy, life away from tennis and his hopes for the future of the game.

World Number 3 Dominic Thiem on his biggest achievements, the best tennis he’s ever played, who he considers his biggest rivals, growing up in Austria, developing his game and the player he’s become today under the guidance of Nicolas Massu.

At what would have been the halfway stage of Roland Garros we’re with two of France’s senior statesman and most mercurial talents in Gael Monfils and Benoit Paire, as well as two of their brightest prospects in Ugo Humbert and Corentin Moutet. We also hear from talented Canadian, Felix Auger Aliassime and Andy Murray compares notes with Manchester United and England’s Marcus Rashford, courtesy of ATP Uncovered.

In part two of our exclusive chat with the one and only Juan Carlos Ferrero we re-join that chat just at the point where Seb Lauzier asks Juan Carlos about his own career – a career that took him to world number 1 via a Grand slam title and a few big losses in major finals along the way as well. It’s a fascinating insight from a former champion of Roland Garros and, as such, we started with what he made of the biggest clay court event of them all being moved this year to late September.

Our special guest this week merited a special show because he is modern day great, a World Number 1 since the turn of the millennium, who these days can be found mostly at his own academy and on tour, guiding the fortunes of Spanish youngster Carlos Alcaraz. In a wide-ranging chat with Juan Carlos Ferrero over the line, he was extremely generous with his time and In part two of our chat, coming soon as a separate podcast, we spoke about his own career, memories, rivals, even regrets. that’s all to come. In this Part 1 we hear all about the young man he’s coaching whose game and temperament have already won comparisons with Rafa Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer.

An incredibly honest chat with Martin Stepanek, coach of Borna Coric, which touched on working with one of the game’s finest young players who perhaps lost his way a bit form and fitness wise last year. We also hear from two men at opposite ends of the age spectrum - 18-year-old Italian Next Gen Champion Jannick Sinner and German veteran, he of the wonderful rolling single-hander, Philipp Kohlschreiber.

We get the lowdown on a top 10 player, from one of the leading coaches on tour Liam Smith. Liam joined us to talk about many things including developing a top 10 player, setting goals, working with men and women and with his new online coaching platform recently launched, we also talked confidence, focus, technique and tactics.

Two-time Arthur Ashe Humanitarian of the Year winner Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi will not allow Pakistan's daily workers to be forgotten during this pandemic. Through his foundation Stop War Start Tennis, Qureshi committed to financially supporting ration bags for thousands of families that have been unable to work and earn their daily sustenance. Each ration bag consists of flour, rice, oil, grains, tea, milk and sanitary products, and can feed a family of five. As we hear in this interview, Qureshi got out in the field himself, making deliveries to those families.

Swede, Freddie Rosengren has coached some of the game’s greats including his countrymen Magnus Norman, Jonas Bjorkman and Robin Soderling, but he’s recently turned his attention to 23-year-old Russian Karen Khachnov who breached the world’s top 10 for the first time in 2019. In this extended chat, we spoke about that new coaching relationship, life on tour, what he’s learnt over the years and how he’s coping in these strange times of lockdown.