The LTA

junior · Intermediate Club Player

The LTA

indiana · Tennis legend

Keen to expand my admittedly limited tennis history knowledge, I found :

atptour.com/en/news/nadal-coria-rome-2005-flashback

Interesting. It certainly doesn't give the impression that they were just trying to get it in, and of course they weren't patting it back!

To quote :

"I was really surprised by how he was running and his shots" Coria said. "I think there are very [few] players who can hit so hard."

OK, it's from the ATP, part of whose raison d'etre is promoting men's tennis, but seriously, were they not hitting it in and rather hard??

Does anyone know more about Rafa's early junior days, ie.re his balance between hard hitting and accuracy?

Oh and I certainly have more time for a hard hitting clay marathon than many. Indeed it doesn't have to be that hard hitting, since it is pure extrapolation beyond anything I have said ( there's been a fair amount of that ) that I just like hard hitting. Indeed it's certainly not true. Federer, McEnroe, Mecir, Aggie Radwanska - whisper it, I have really liked watching all of them. And I don't necessarily dislike big servers but I sure don't like watching two of them playing each other if they have little else to offer beyond power.

-- Edited by indiana on Friday 5th of February 2021 04:21:50 PM

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Link wont open for me, but around 2005, wasnt Nadal doing the big biceps thing with rumours (right or wrong) of doping going on around that time?

I am guessing they were never true and hope they werent!

indiana · Tennis legend

JonH comes home wrote:
Link wont open for me, but around 2005, wasnt Nadal doing the big biceps thing with rumours (right or wrong) of doping going on around that time?

I am guessing they were never true and hope they werent!

Maybe Rafa did more build power on top of a very accurate game from his early days than more accuracy steadily added on top of a hard hitting game. I have no agenda, genuinely interested which is why I asked re his younger days.

junior · Intermediate Club Player

Fear not Indy for I am here to set you on the path of knowledge.

As you know that the media prints things how they want or how it benefits them. Would you likely read something that said a match/game became boring after 1 hour if it was? This obviously wasnt the case in these matches they played, most of them were 5 hours, 5 sets atp masters finals which were emotional and awesome (big parts of them are on youtube). Unfortunately they took each other to such a physical limit its not normal for two young players to be able to keep it up for such entended periods of matches. To answer your second question within this: Coria had very little in the way of power etc, he ran like crazy though, to a level to make De Minaur look tame, and up until 2010 Rafa had no real serve (I once trained with the guy who remolded Rafa's serve in 2010) or no backhand/slice only forehand. So expecting a match of such hulk levels of smash between these two is not realistic as your page writes. The same with the last few games of the greatest match in history Federer/Nadal Wimbledon Final 2008, the last half a set was unforced error, double fault, ball half way up the net because of the pressure and physical exhaustion, did smacking the ball help either of them then? (Federer who we know is more than capable of playing games only of aces) or perhaps back to basics and good old fashioned make the ball in the court.

-- Edited by junior on Friday 5th of February 2021 04:18:21 PM

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Well, Indy, I hope you're enlightened

In response to the question about young Rafa, though, (and the biomechanics one is still unanswered too, I note, but I get the feeling that may be opening a whole can of worms

), I can't help really, even though I did see him play once at Les Petits As. Not enough to give an informed opinion for what you're asking though. However, there are lots of video clips on youtube etc. which you could have a glance at (although, again, not sure how much a couple of matches show).

My own feeling, re your question, though, is that taking the very top players is maybe not that useful - it's definitely really interesting re Rafa, I'd be curious too, but only for that specific guy, not as a base for a theory (the 'freakishly' good players are not good examples). And, indeed, even for those, there's always the two ends of the spectrum - seemingly, Ostapenko hit the fluff off each and every ball she ever hit from the age of 8 upwards and absolutely refused to ever rein it in. Benneteau, for instance (not 'top' guy but I remember an interview about it very well so I'm using his example) said he could never go flat out, not as a kid, not now, his tennis just fell apart, rather, as per junior, he had to get the base (ball in) and then edge up in little increments. I'm sure you'd find tons (top and right the way down) who fit in either camp (or 80:20 say in either camp). THere might be a distinction here, too, between hitting hard, with good technique, (not wild swings) and putting it back, with good technique (not pit-pat). i.e. the difference is less marked than one would think. So maybe we're all closer than it would seem

junior · Intermediate Club Player

Coup wishes to discourage anyone away from seeing or hearing things that disprove his point. That the least technical player on tour is also one of the best in history if not the very best.

Women's tennis is only smacking the ball bad example to pick, Benneteau always gave the opinion of either holding back or just not powerful. If all players spanked the ball out of the court our sport wouldn't be much of a spectacle, especially with the changes made over the last 20plus years to make points longer and more balls in the court over the one/two shot points i.e serve and volley

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Personally, I wish there was still space for a good serve volleyer. My favourites of all time are those players. Not the big servers like isner, he wasnt a serve volleyer neither was roddick, nor was federer. Mac, Becker, Edberg, cash. And before them. Should still be space for players like them. A disservice was done when the game slowed down and took their like out.

Jan · Hall of fame

JonH comes home wrote:
Personally, I wish there was still space for a good serve volleyer. My favourites of all time are those players. Not the big servers like isner, he wasnt a serve volleyer neither was roddick, nor was federer. Mac, Becker, Edberg, cash. And before them. Should still be space for players like them. A disservice was done when the game slowed down and took their like out.

Hear hear!

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Jan wrote:
JonH comes home wrote:
Personally, I wish there was still space for a good serve volleyer. My favourites of all time are those players. Not the big servers like isner, he wasnt a serve volleyer neither was roddick, nor was federer. Mac, Becker, Edberg, cash. And before them. Should still be space for players like them. A disservice was done when the game slowed down and took their like out.
Hear hear!

Its too uniform. My favourite Wimbledon final ever was Agassi v goran, it was the classic match up. Epic. Worst ever was Hewitt v nalbandian! Yuk.

the addict · Tennis legend

LTA Competitions
@LTACompetitions

4:10 PM · Feb 11, 2021

"We have made the decision to extend the cancellation of tennis competitions up to Sunday 21 March.

If the lifting of restrictions allows for them to take place before then, we will look to restart some Matchplay events & local comps to give players the opportunity to compete."

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Presumably the UK Pro Series League will need to be pushed back as well?

www.ukproleague.com/the-schedule

the addict · Tennis legend

JonH comes home wrote:
Presumably the UK Pro Series League will need to be pushed back as well?

www.ukproleague.com/the-schedule

As the first four events are all scheduled for Loughborough University, I would imagine that they can still run it as an elite competition as the pro events were last year. I think the LTA is mainly refering to the many amateur competitions that are run around the country.

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

the addict wrote:
JonH comes home wrote:
Presumably the UK Pro Series League will need to be pushed back as well?

www.ukproleague.com/the-schedule
As the first four events are all scheduled for Loughborough University, I would imagine that they can still run it as an elite competition as the pro events were last year. I think the LTA is mainly refering to the many amateur competitions that are run around the country.

oh, ok, that would make sense. What about the British Tour, there seems to be no plan for that, is that elite level or is it regarded as "amateur"?

the addict · Tennis legend

It is pretty rare to see any ranked players in the British Tour events now - just the occasional one or two, on the women's side anyway. Most participants seem to be juniors, so little chance of the British Tour resuming.
BTW, when I used the word amateur I was meaning just that, hardly any tour players in evidence.

For example, the Summer County Cup. Quite a few ranked men do take part in just the top division, and a few of the women, but there are seven divisions.................