Tennis With An Accent: Is Roger Federer Getting Preferential Treatment?

Last week, Darren Cahill stepped away from coaching WTA World No. 1 Simona Halep in order to spend more time with his family. Cahill’s coaching career isn’t over, but this marks a good time to consider what has made him such an effective and important coach — for Halep, yes, but also for Lleyton Hewitt and Andre Agassi.

Saqib and Matt talk about Halep’s willingness to trust Cahill in difficult moments, which branches into a larger exploration of the art of coaching and the strength of player-coach relationships in tennis and in basketball. Tennis coaches past and present are mentioned: Larry Stefanki, Magnus Norman, Tony Roche, and Ivan Lendl, among others.

In the second half of the podcast, the co-hosts tackle the topic everyone in tennis is talking about this week: Julien Benneteau’s comments to French media about the preferential treatment given to Roger Federer and the conflicts of interest which are widely prevalent in the tennis industry. Is Benneteau fundamentally accurate? That’s a simple question. The harder question to answer: What can be done in tennis to address the concerns Benneteau raised in his remarks? Another follow-up question: How much does Benneteau’s view of the inner workings of tennis truly reflect — and relate to — the way major tournaments schedule Roger Federer?

The tennis season might be almost over, but the discussion of hot topics in tennis never ends at Tennis With An Accent.

Thanks for listening!

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Music provided by Teknoaxe and used under the terms of CC (Creative Commons) 4.0 license.