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Can Andy Roddick Win Another Slam?
For over 20 years now many Coaches and National Tennis
Federations around the world, decided to develop players the
easy way, with one-mode robot like baseline tennis. Fortunately
2 players survived this onslaught and have kept the interest
alive in the serve and volley all court game, Pete Sampras and
Roger Federer with Andy Roddick in a grey zone between these two
great players.
Due to that one dimensional teaching of tennis by coaches and
federations,, today everyone that faces Roger has the jitters.
They have no answers or solutions for the challenges Roger
presents. This has awakened every expert in the world to talk
wonders about the "all court game"! The very same game that
20/30 years ago they themselves almost killed with new rules,
heavier balls, bigger balls, slower balls etc...and by following
certain "tennis gurus" with poor coaching/development examples
or tennis knowledge. Remember that everyone turned their backs
on the teachings of a great Master of the all court training the
late Harry Hopman "The
Fox".
Now back to Andy Roddick; all these technical Coaching trials at
bettering his backhand or his volleys or his returns are purely
making him lose confidence.... now everyone is talking about
Andy Roddick developing a more all court game! Amen! Pete
Sampras was saying that with his game style to all coaches for
15 years!
With Andy Roddick it would be foolish to tinker with the core of
his game at this point of his career. Those things (weak parts
of his game) will better themselves as he grows as a
professional, practices and gets smarter, eg. experience and
more self-confidence. Nevertheless the weaker parts of his game
will always be "weaknesses".
If you all remember Stefen Edberg had a "poor forehand" and a
not so good forehand volley! The same was for Jimmy Connors
with his "poor mid-court low forehand" and "weak serve", or with
Guillermo Villas "no serve" and weak volleys, or Michael Chang
trying to get a "Bigger service" all his career and last, Ivan
Lendl trying to stop being a "chicken" or to better his volleys
to win Wimbledon (I guess Lendl should have let Tony Roche
volley for him at Wimbledon when needed!...not to mention the
mental debacle in 1989 at Rolland Garros). Yet, these players
turned out to be great champions even though those weaknesses
followed and pestered them throughout their careers.
Then Sergio what's the secret? There is a simple secret:
Top class players learn to compensate or hide their weaknesses
the best they can sometimes even with ruses! For example, you
problably may not remember an Italian player called Corrado
Barazzutti, but the his ploy was to look like a loser to you,
act like a loser, look miserable, despondent, get down on
himself. He walked with his head slightly down almost inside
his stooped shoulders, all in all he was the antithesis of Dr.
James E. Loehr (famous sports psychologist), stay positive, I
love the battle, pumping fists, agressive, mighty fighter full
of adreneline type. But, boy you miss a bit and Corrado "Mama
mia" Barrazutti took you to the cleaners and you were on the
next airplane home or to the next tournament. Corrado was a
great competitor and athlete. He made it to the respectable
career ATP high ranking of 7 in the World with many brilliant
wins!
Great players learn to play on
their strengths and base their
games on their strengths and they win the most by NOT deviating
from what they do best, whatever that is. That is the secret!
Remember Boris "BOOM BOOM!" Becker? Now imagine if Ion Tiriac or
Bobby Brett had told Boris, "Boris, you have a great 1st serve
but, you need to get a much higher percentage of first serves
in".... you get the idea, we would never had gotten to know
"BOOM BOOM" Becker and he probably would never had won Wimbledon
either!
Now to our young friend Andy Roddick, coaching and over coaching
has taken away from Andy Rodick what were his greatest tools and
what I call his core strengths or weapons:
-The punishing aces (he hits a lot less aces now then 4 or 5
years ago!).
- The risk-taking forcing second service (when he first came
onto the scene his second serve was a weapon, today it is
not!). Remember how Pete Sampras used is second serve as a
weapon!
- The punishing shots inside the court. Today Andy is playing
80% of his aggressive or defensive shots 12 to 15 feet behind
the baseline! He basicly runs unecessary miles that take away
much needed energy for further winning matches and for a long
tennis season.
What does Roddick need to do? Forget about the Coaching and the
experts! Go with his instincts, his power game, his natural
strengths:
- Use his biggest weapons at all time, be it big first services,
big second serves or serve and volley occasionally.
- Stop playing 15 feet behind the baseline! Play 3 to 6 feet
from the baseline and get inside the court at every opportunity
he gets and hit the big forehand WINNERS! Never give up an
inch!
- Go to the net and mix the approach shots with short fades or
disguised drop-shots and mix solid volleying with
drop-angled-volleys.
- When attacking go 85% of the times up the line use very few
cross court approaches.
- Never worry about the volley, if he gets inside the court, he
will get easy enough put away volleys.
- Return closer to the baseline and darn it, he must get inside
the court on those second serves pound them or go to the net and
put some kind of pressure on the other guys serves (chip &
charge you name it!).
- From point one get ahold of his opponents and rattle them
with his sheer physical power and never let go. Like Jimmy
Connors use to do with his strokes.
- Take control of the center of the tennis court and of the
match; mentally, physically and with his shots.
Finally, in the grand slams he has to be able to do this at all
times 3 sets in a row or 5 intercalated if he is forced to. He
needs to decrease the amount of rounds with long five set
matches to 3 sets. He also has to increase the level of his
self-belief, concentration and general stamina!
Easier said then done, but I believe that the young man can do
it!
For comments on this article please contact Sergio Cruz
www.tenniscruz.com
About the author:
Sergio Cruz is an ex # 1 National Champion, Davis Cup Player
from Portugal and former Coach Jim Courier ATP World Ranking # 1
www.tenniscruz.com
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