Hutchins Snr Moving on

Count Zero · Tennis legend

Hutchins Snr Moving on

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

Hmm! Wonder what prompted that...

Shhh · Challenger level

Mens tennis has performed at its worse for a few years since he's been in charge. Maybe any improvements have happened to those of a younger age??????

What does not appear to be good is 3 people now sharing the job. Everything needs a clear leader, its looks a bit of a mish-mash at the moment.

steven · Tennis legend

Neil Harman's article in the Times today suggests that they've also taken on the Belgian Davis Cup coach Julien Hoferlein to work with "three of Britain's better 18 to 19-year-olds" ... I wonder who they might be.

Our top-ranked 18- and 19- year olds at the moment are:

Dan Evans WR 558, 18
Dan Cox WR 792, 18
Sean Thornley WR 812, 19
Josh Milton WR 851, 19
Alex Ward WR 988, 18
David Rice WR 998, 19
Dan Smethurst WR 1013, 18
Marcus Willis WR 1091, 18

... though I guess the fact that it was mentioned in conjunction with the other changes on the men's side might not necessarily mean that he's only going to be working on that side of it.

-- Edited by steven at 12:56, 2008-10-22

Akhenaten · Pro player

Illingworth is 21, Steven. According to ITF anyway.

Drew · Oct 22, 2008

Shhh wrote:
Mens tennis has performed at its worse for a few years since he's been in charge. Maybe any improvements have happened to those of a younger age??????

What does not appear to be good is 3 people now sharing the job. Everything needs a clear leader, its looks a bit of a mish-mash at the moment.

I dont think Paul can be blamed for the state of mens tennis. He has been working mostly with the young guys and the problems stem back further than 2 years.
We seem to have a good crop of young guys...heres hoping !

kundalini · Specialist Reporter + Intermediate Club Player

On GBTGs they are more positive about the Draper regime as they say this is the first time that a new leadership has been willing to support the more established players in the hope that they might make the breakthrough into the top 100 and thus inspire some of the younger players that top 100 is possible. Previously the approach had been to give up on those ranked around 175-350 and focus on the younger players.

On the men's side, I don't get the sense that they are that interested in supporting the players currently inside the top 500. Even the whole Boggo/Gilbert thing was more a case of not wanting to pay off Brad and desperately trying to find a job he could do for a bit. Anyone with half a brain could have told them that Gilbert was not a good match for Boggo.

At least in terms of top 500 players in the last couple of years, the striking thing is how many of them have retired.

I think one thing the LTA have failed to understand is that coaching is a relationship between a player and a coach. The key is the relationship. Spending a fortune on hiring coaches who have had success with highly talented players completely misses the point. Annacone had a great relationship with Sampras. Brad Gilbert had an excellent relationship with Agassi. Neither Petchey nor Gilbert recognised the importance of the relationship, when working with Andy Murray. They were too busy telling him what to do on the tennis court, which quite frankly, most of the posters on here could have done equally well.

What's this got to do with Paul Hutchins? Probably nothing.

steven · Tennis legend

Akhenaten wrote:
Illingworth is 21, Steven. According to ITF anyway.

Oops, thanks - for some reason I entered his DoB on the top 25 table as 23/4/89 when it should have been 23/6/87. Hopefully that was a one-off!

Count Zero · Tennis legend

i agree Kundalini, relationships are vital. in some ways you would say that boggo's best results came with Mike Raphael, (i think he won back to back challengers with him), although he also did well with Lundgeren.

as i said to Steven elsewhere i am glad Annacone is still onboard, as i think he is good for the british tennis and we need more like him around.

i guess we will have to wait and see how this pans out.

hopefully the LTA will introduce more events back into the calendar too.

steven · Tennis legend

It'll be interesting to see whether they do introduce more events back into the calendar, but there's a danger that they'll look at the ranking increases this year (20 of the top 25 GB men are up this year, 16 of them by more than 100 places!) and conclude that reducing the number of home Futures and Challengers was the right thing to do.

I hope not, because the main reason for this is that we have had a lot of relative youngsters coming up at the same time and less disruption from injuries than in the previous 12 months, even taking into account Jamie and Morgan being out for most of the year.

Indeed, I get the impression (without checking) that more total points may have been scored by Brits in home Futures this year than last year, despite the drop in the number of events, with Dan Evans having quite a lot to do with that! Same reasons as above, plus there don't seem to be quite as many good overseas players playing in GB Futures this year - perhaps because there aren't enough GB Futures for them to build their year round any more (in which case the LTA might have got something right there!), but there seem to be a lot of 15K+H Futures in France this year, so if there are more of them than last year (I haven't checked), that might be the explanation instead, in which case we'd have to give part of the credit for the Brit ranking rises to the French Federation. wink

One thing I think the LTA definitely did get right (and not before time) was to hold a mix of 10Ks and 15Ks instead of all 10Ks for a year or all 15Ks for a year as has happened in the past.

What I'd really like to see though (more than the reinstatement of some of the 'missing' UK Futures) is the reinstatement of some more UK Challengers (and better advertising of them, etc) - that shouldn't be too hard to argue for given that we have more Challenger level players than we did a year ago and a few more likely to reach that level in the foreseeable future as well.

Goldenslam · Intermediate Club Player

I think Paul has done a great job for British Tennis & has done some superb things with the juniors, I for one am sad to see him step down as I think he was pulling the mens/boys game in the right direction & really improved the level & knowledge of players & coaches over the last 2 years. He is by far & away the best guy we have had in the job since he was last in it.

As a leader & man manager he will be & tough act to follow, I am glad he will still be working at the LTA, as some one of his level must be involved in British Tennis in some way shape or form.

.....whatever happend please do NOT bring back David Felgate!!!!!!! weirdface

steven · Tennis legend

Harman covers this at the end of his TMC article on Andy in the Thunderer today. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/tennis/article5119687.ece

"Away from the court there have been subtle shifts in administration and none more so than in Britain, where Paul Hutchins was removed from his position as head of mens tennis without an explanation. Murray was not told, nor his input required into the matter. When Roger Draper, the chief executive of the LTA, decided two years ago to fire David Felgate, the former head of performance, he called Tim Henman to explain the reasons why and to make sure it would not upset the former British No 1 that his one-time coach was to be removed.

There was no such tip of the hat to Murray in Hutchinss case and this to someone the Scot described yesterday as a great guy. Remarkable, too, was Murrays revelation that Hutchins was the only person at the LTA who ever came and asked me if I had opinions on anything. He added: Im sad to see him leave.

There, as in so much, Murray forges on alone and Roddick, who faces the Scot first, will have noticed the British No 1s recent game. Last year, he had a setback with his injury, Roddick said. And I remember when he lost to Tsonga in the Australian Open, you guys were ready to deport him. He got over his little hump at Wimbledon this year and now hes on his way. "

Intriguing ...

Drew · Nov 10, 2008

I agree....Paul seemed to be popular with the top guys !