Dubai: Russia’s Dmitry Tursunov has spoken out in favour of the use of on-court coaching on the ATP World Tour.
Totally at the behest of the players, on-court coaching has been allowed on the WTA Tour to help women boost their fortunes during a match.
However, the idea, though mooted on the men’s tour, has never been driven forward.
“I am not sure if on-court coaching will make it more exciting for the spectators. So if that would make it more popular with the fans, I would definitely say we should give it a try. But at the moment, there never seem to be questions raised about it. There has never been a need for it. So I guess that’s why we have never moved towards it,” Tursunov told media on Saturday.
“It seems to be working with the women, but the one big drawback is that if a player is travelling without a coach due to his lack of funds and someone who he is playing has a coach, it does make the conditions a bit unfair. But I think it is going to be very difficult to have a set-up where everything is fair to everyone all the time. There’s always going to be some degree of unfairness. It’s just the nature of the game,” he added.
“The goal of the coaches is to help the player function without a coach. But yeah, it definitely helps quite a bit when you do start panicking in some difficult conditions through a match. The coach can come out and snap you out of it.”
The second best player in Russia [behind Mihail Youzhny] was drawn to play a qualifier in the opening round of the main draw.
In fact, the 31-year-old had joked before the draw that he would prefer an easy draw this week.
“A few years back things were different, but right now, there is almost no player that you would like to play against as everyone is difficult,” the Russian said.
“I mean you have [Roberto] Bautista Agut, you have Nikolay Davydenko, you have a lot of other players. A few weeks ago, Bautista Agut beat Juan Martin del Potro at the Australian Open and he is unseeded here. So there are definitely a lot of good players here,” he added.
