Happenstance sent former WTA Top 50 player Anastasia Yakimova into a coaching career in Denmark, writes @Pervinkel

Translation of this piece by Per Colstrup Vinkel for Tennis Avisen.

Anastasia Yakimova still knows how to swing a tennis racquet. This year she won the Leschly Cup with a win over Karina Ildor. The Belorussian’s day job is coaching for Fruens Bøge Tennis Club in Odense, Denmark.

26 and a forced into retirement

For most people, it’s a horror scenario, but for Anastasia Yakimova, the narrative has more to it than an unfortunate career retirement. It’s been six years since her body told her to stop, and the Belorussian player, who had a whole life built in and round tennis, was forced seek other opportunities. It became quickly clear that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree: tennis was, and will always be, a part of the Belorussian’s life.
“Not being 100% and playing at the top of international tennis isn’t sustainable. I’d played on the WTA Tour for 11 years, and my body could feel it. I wanted to take a small break from tennis to discover what coaching abilities I had. It was a great experience from the beginning, and it motivated me so much that I never thought about resuming my playing career. I’ve never regretted my choice,” relates Anastasia Yakimova. Her highest WTA ranking was 49 in singles, and her best Slam result was was in 2007, when she made the third round of the Australian Open. Yakimova managed to end the year in the WTA Top 100 for three seasons.

Denmark by happenstance

In Spain she got the chance to become co-owner of a tennis school, which, among other things, arranged an yearly international youth tennis tournament. Head tennis coach Frank Petersen from Sønderborg was a steady participant with a group of Danish juniors. Relations were established and Yakimova was invited to Denmark as a guest coach at a summer school for elite players.

“My first visit to Denmark was around five years ago, and I came every summer since.  When the opportunity for a coaching job in Danmark came around, I grabbed it. It was Frank who encouraged me to do it. It suited me perfectly, as it came at a time when I was looking for new challenges,” relates Anstasia Yakimova.
Besides being a part of the first team in Fruens Bøge Tennis Club and playing a series of international club tennis tournaments, the Belorussian is also functions as coach for the clubs top players. It’s a unique opportunity for a provencial club to attract a coach with so much international experience as Anastasia Yakimova.

A world of difference

One thing is how we see ourselves. That would never be a 100% accurate. We think as Danes that we do pretty well, not the least in giving our children the best opportunities, and making sure that all became part of society.
For Anasasia Yakimova, the Danish experience has been interesting in this area. It’s taught her some things  about how to approach life, things that weren’t part of her growing up in Belarus.
“When I started as a small child in Belarus, there was no opportunity to play tennis ‘for fun’. It was all about becoming professional and earning money. That’s a contrast to the experience in Denmark. Children have a lot of opportunities, which means they can prioritise tennis at exactly the level they wish. That’s the big difference between my former and present countries. There are a lot more here in Denmark who play tennis because they enjoy it. It’s a lovely experience for me to see that you can enjoy tennis without striving after results. I work daily, though, with the serious players, those with ambitions. They’ll always be the ones closest to my heart,” Yakimova explains.

Even though there are big differences between Belarus and Denmark, there are also many similarities. According to Anastasia Yakimova, it’s that tennis gives a good start in life for most youths. It can help them move on in life even without racquet and balls.

“Playing sports keeps you going, you’re active. Competing and solving problems on your own gives young people important tools, tools they can use later on in life. Because when you’re out there on the court, there’s only you who can find the solutions. No one can do things for you. It’s helped me a lot, also off the tennis court,” relates the Belorussian.
She admits that it’s still misses the WTA and tennis at the highest level, the travelling around the world, and the experience in first class. On the other hand, Anastasia Yakimova stresses that she really sees tennis as life education, an education at the same level as what a university can offer. It’s an education that has led her to Denmark.
Can the local tennis players in Odense be inspired by Yakimova’s story? It’s to be hoped.

Caroline Wozniacki: “She was a girl who was trained to achieve one goal or another from the start”

From small, thin girl on the Køge Tennis Club courts to world’s best. A weekly schedule, extra training and a family that gambled everything. By Mikkel  Hemmer-Hansen, Jyllands-Posten https://jyllands-posten.dk/protected/premium/sport/ECE9261914/det-var-en-pige-der-blev-traenet-efter-et-eller-andet-maal-helt-fra-starten/

The glass trophy gets a big kiss.

She’s done it before.

Caroline Wozniacki reached 25 tournament wins on the WTA tour when she won the Hong Kong Open in October 2016.

Another achievement for the 26-year-old Dane, who has achieved much in her career: two US Open finals, over 150 million Danish Crowns in prize money, and been number one in the world. That was in 2011, when she won the Danish Sports Name of the Year award.

She’s a success story. But very few know how hard she worked as a child on the courts of the Køge Tennis Club, and how much Caroline and her family have done and sacrificed to go all the way.

Like all other tennis kids at the Køge Tennis Club, Wozniacki began by playing with a big foam-rubber ball because it was easier to hit and not as hard to get over the net.

“Ball play takes up most of the time at that age level. They play with foam-rubber balls and often on the half court. It’s about keeping focus on the play aspect so the children stay motivated. But she quickly went past that level and started playing on the full court,” relates lawyer Helene Treschow, who was children’s coach at the Køge Tennis Club while she studied law and coached Caroline Wozniacki for a short time.

Caroline Wozniacki started playing more and more with regular balls on the full court, both with big brother Patrik and her father Piotr, who began coming more and more often to the club along with her mother Anna. It was a family project.

Sometimes Caroline would hit against a wall that’s still standing today at the club, though it’s now overgrown with weeds. But she often trained with her father.

“When Piotr trained with her, it was more concrete: a basket of balls to the forehand, and a basket of balls to the backhand,” says Helene Treschow.

Caroline improved a lot and began to beat older players. She trained with several teams, both those with older players, and with the boys.

Practising with the club champion

At one point, Piotr turned to the clubs best male player, club champion Peter Buser.

“Piotr himself wasn’t very good at tennis, so he got hold of people who could play with her. Piotr asked me if I would hit with her. I was a kid of twenty, and I could hit the ball a bit harder. She was bloody good already as an 8-year-old. She hit the ball well, she hit it cleanly and hard,” relates Peter Buser.

Also read: Interview with Piotr Wozniacki: “I’ve forgotten to enjoy myself and I regret that”

He describers the whole family as friendly, nice and very ambitious.

“There was a plan. There aren’t many girls of 8 who are set up to play against boys of 20. She was given harder match-ups to get her used to return shots that came with greater pace. There was nothing accidental about it,” says Peter Buser.

The amount of tennis was increased.

“Piotr was always on the court, whether it was Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday or Saturday. He took her to other countries to play tournaments so she could see what was necessary. They were thinking big already then. A lot of time and money was spent,” says Peter Buser.

Later on, a new coach arrived. It was Jan Hansen, who at that time was part-time coach at Køge Tennis Club.

She always had talent for her two-handed backhand, while the rest of the shots needed more work

“She improved a lot. Apart from the normal training with the club’s coaches, I spent a lot of extra hours with her. She always had talent for her two-handed backhand, while the rest of the shots needed more work,” says Jan Hansen.

During that time, Piotr became more and more interested in coaching.

“He absorbed everything from the coaches she had, and his interest began to grow. He absorbed what he could use, and what he saw that was a good fit for Caroline. We talked a lot about what was best for her,” says Jan Hansen.

Sunday was an off-day

She began to beat senior players already as a 9-year-old.

“The first time she played a senior team match, there wasn’t a T-shirt in her size. On her, it was a tennis dress”

“The first time she played a senior team match, there wasn’t a T-shirt in her size. On her, it was a tennis dress, and she played against players who were almost twice as tall as her,” says Helene Treschow.

The amount of tennis was again increased, and the weekly schedule was systematised.

“Her whole week was planned. She was off every Sunday, and she could play with her friends. She practised tennis and did her homework on the other days. When she was 11, she often trained in the morning before she went to school, and then again in the afternoon after school,” relates Jan Hansen.

Piotr Wozniacki had been a professional football (soccer) player and her mother had a career as a top volleyball player (ed note: volleyball is huge in Poland). That had an influence on the effort and the seriousness.

“They had an idea about what was needed. They both knew that something extraordinary was required to go all the way. Maybe that’s why it was so planned from the beginning. Some may wonder at that approach. They came from Eastern Europe, where it was more structured and tougher, some might think. But it’s what was necessary to get to this level,” says Jan Hansen.

The family went all the way to make Caroline better.

“I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve seen a lot of good players, but no one who has trained and sacrificed so much for it. It was a girl who who was trained for one goal or another from the start,” says Peter Buser.

Always with a smile

Caroline Wozniacki herself described the period and years at the Køge Tennis Club like this:

“I often think back to when I was 10-11, and my dad and I drove out to the Køge Tennis Club at 10 in the evening because the courts were busy until then. I’d trained at 6 AM there, and we went out there late in the evening to train some more,” said Caroline Wozniacki to Jyllands-Posten in 2015.

All agree that it was tough on Caroline. But was it too much?

“I never saw a girl who looked sad. She always had a smile on her lips. There’s a lot of talk about how Piotr was a hard man, and he was, but she always seemed happy. I never experience her being forced to play against her will. And they still have a good relationship. He’s still her coach,” says Peter Buser.

Jan Hansen is of the same opinion.

“She loved tennis and she was always happy and positive. She quickly got ambitions because she realised she was good. There were times it was tough for her, no doubt about it. Who wouldn’t feel it was tough while training six days a week? Sometimes her father encouraged her to train. But the vast majority of the time she just trained and loved it,” says Jan Hansen.

At the age of 11, Caroline Wozniacki became senior club champion at the Køge Tennis Club, and a few months later, she shifted to Farum.

“There were better training facilities at the Elite Centre in Farum, and more good players. The family invested so much in her that they moved with her. They lived in Herfølge, but it was too long a drive to training, so they got an apartment in Farum,” says Jan Hansen.

It picked up speed from there, and she became Danish champion at 14, and declared in an interview after that her goal “was to become number one, the world’s best.”

Non of those three coaches have experienced anything similar either before or after.

“What happened then was completely unique. I’ve been a top 10 player in Denmark and seen a lot of talents, and I’ve coached a lot of talented players, but I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve never seen anyone spend so much time on it. What they did during those years was completely unique,” says Helen Treschow.

Do you think another player from Denmark will come along with the same level as Wozniacki?

“I hope so, but I don’t think so. That’s why we need to appreciate her. She’ll be gone in one or two years, and there’ll be a huge hole in Danish tennis,” says Jan Hansen.

 

Translated by MAN

 

Frederik Løchte Nielsen: Revelations make me mentally stronger. Part one of three.

Part one of a three part interview by Philip Ørnø on the Danish tennis site Tennisavisen.dk with Danish pro Frederik Løchte Nielsen, who won the Wimbledon doubles title with Jonathan Marray in 2012.

Frederik Løchte Nielsen has managed the transition from junior to senior as few other Danes have done. So it seemed natural to ask him how he tackled the mental side of the game. In this conversation he spoke of the “revelations” a tennis player can get – both on and off the court.

When I hear revelation, I think of a turning point in your life where you suddenly see things from a new angle and in an extremely constructive way. It’s an “aha” moment or a moment of clarity.

Løchte Nielsen has had an astonishing number of revelations, but three stand out for him:

A couple of weeks ago, just before the Davis Cup, I saw a documentary about football in Colombia, about drug money and players who were killed when they lost. It struck me that they were playing for their lives, and that tennis had absolutely no consequences for my life. I play because I choose to and because it makes me happy.

The only consequence tennis can have for my life is that every time I don’t compete happy or with peace of mind, it’s a match lost on my record. The only consequence it has is that I can lose the opportunity for many more experiences. There are no existential consequences.

I have a roof over my head, food and a bed, and even when things go badly, I’ll likely figure something out, so that aspect of my life is never in danger. So why do I get nervous, why do I get angry and disappointed in myself? The are no consequences with losing. They’re imaginary.

That revelation goes seems to segue into the next.

Problems are imaginary. They don’t exist. They’re only problems when I make them problems.

There are no bad balls

It’s likely happened to most players that their forehand or backhand is suddenly a problem. But it’s only something we pretend, thinks Løchte Nielsen. If we conclude that we’re hitting the ball badly, then we’re hitting it badly because we choose to.

It’s the same with bad conditions – bad balls, courts, situations, that my opponent is cheating – “bad” is a value you attribute to it which doesn’t help you as a player. It’s something I’ve become very aware of.

Løchte Nielsen has a rule: he mustn’t use adjectives with words like balls, courts, tournaments etc. He must only use constructive sentences like: “the court is slow so I need to prepare myself to play longer rallies.” That way he’s simply trying to control what he can control.

No one is afraid of losing

The third and last revelation for Frederik was as much a theory as a revelation:

No one in tennis is afraid of losing. I think players are afraid of facing their demons, which are much more exposed by a loss than a win. We can disguise it better when there are good results on the board. We can forget our demons when we win, or we can in any case be blind to them.

With a loss we’re reminded of our demons and the things we don’t like about ourselves. I think we’ve all had the experience of leaving the court as losers when we’ve played really well. So it isn’t losses were afraid of – we’re afraid of performing badly. And that’s also why so many defence mechanism come out.”

Instead of throwing excuses around, you need to prepare yourself, thinks Løchte Nielsen. Accept the level you’re at, accept that there are limitations. In that way you can be fair to yourself and not be so hard on yourself when things go badly. Or as Løchte Nielsen says:

When things go badly, it’s not because I’m doing it on purpose. I can’t control the outcome, so I shouldn’t be so hard on myself. I can be hard on myself for only three things: intention, intensity and concentration. Those are the three things I can control.

Translated by MAN

Denmark – Police investigating match fixing in tennis

Translation of  http://www.b.dk/nationalt/politiet-undersoeger-matchfixing-i-tennis

by Mette Dahlgaard and Eva Jung, December 28, 2014

Police investigating match fixing in tennis

The Fraud Squad are investigating an attempt to pay up to 30 Danish players money to lose

The Fraud Squad, who investigate and press charges in cases involving economic and international crime, are now for the first time involved in a case of attempted match fixing in tennis. It happened in the late summer at Futures tournaments, the lowest tennis level, held in Aarhus and Copenhagen.

The Deputy General State Prosecutor Per Fiig has stated that the State Attorney for Special Economic Crimes and International Criminality has found cause to start an investigation, but at the moment cannot say anything about the current investigation.

The Danish daily Politiken had a story earlier that there was an attempt to bribe with large sums of money tennis players to lose a set on purpose. Berlingske can now publish details in the case, such as how the match fixers went about it.

“It’s gratifying the the Danish prosecutors are looking at the case. I’m looking forward to what might happen. I’m very satisfied that this is being taken seriously because the problem won’t disappear on its own,” says Sune Irgens Alenkær, who is a director of the Danish Tennis Association (DTA).

The Danish Athletic Association (DAA) is also gratified by the news that the Fraud Squad is interested in the case.

“It’s super positive. It hasn’t been pleasant to see that there have been foreign match fixers willing to operate in Denmark in connexion with competitions. Because everything points to it being foreign match fixers, we haven’t, as a Danish association,  had jurisdiction over it, so we couldn’t investigate the case directly. If the police have taken up the case, we can only welcome it,” says Jesper Frigast Larsen, who is head of the DAAs Match Fixing Committee.

The Danish Tennis Association, who arranged the tournament together with Århus 1900 and Copenhagen’s Ball Club, have since the late summer been unable to gain any insight into where the case stands. The International Tennis Federation’s (ITF) own investigative arm, the Tennis Integrity Unit (TIU) gathered evidence in the form of e-mails, Facebook messages and text messages. The Danish association has since been kept in the dark of it’s own parent organisation, which, despite numerous enquiries, hasn’t found time to meet with the DTA.

Berlingske has been in contact with several of the tennis players who all tell the same story: they were offered around 30,000 Danish Crowns ($4,500 US) to lose a set, but they haven’t heard from either the TIU or the Danish police about making statements. They handed over all evidence to an ITF supervisor who was at the tournament. But the German supervisor, Nico Naeve, has been muzzled, he wrote in an e-mail to Berlingske.

Asked directly what the status of the Danish case was, the TIU answered: “We are aware of the accusations at the tournaments in Denmark, but we cannot answer specific questions,” they wrote.

The Danish Athletic Association understands that there needs to be quiet about ongoing investigations, but “clamming up” isn’t the way forward.

“We don’t believe at all that one’s sport is protected by pretending the problem doesn’t exist. We tip our hats to football/soccer that has doen a lot to address the problem.”

Translated by @markalannixon

Tennis match fixing in Denmark: “Are you interested in making some money on the side?”

 

From  the Danish http://www.b.dk/nationalt/er-du-interesseret-i-at-lave-nogle-penge-ved-siden-af by Mette Dahlgaard og Eva Jung

“Are you interested in making some money on the side?”

No thank you. 30,000 Danish Crowns doesn’t sound like the kind of money you’d want to risk your career for. But for constantly travelling tennis players, the offer can help pay the expensive travel costs, point out players who said no to the offer.

Do you need 30,000 crowns?

That was the question upwards of 30 tennis players were asked when they took part in a tennis tournament – a tournament at the lowest professional level – in Aarhus and Copenhagen respectively in the late summer. The person or persons behind the offers contacted the players by text message, by e-mail or by Facebook and wrote in English that they didn’t need to lose the match. Just one set would be rewarded with €4,000, the equivalent of around 30,000 Crowns.

“I’m your contact person, and I can meet you in person in Copenhagen to give you a deposit of €2,000 today,  you will get the rest after the job is done,” was the message.

€4,000 is a large sum in a competition where the women’s winner got $1,568 and the men’s got $2,160.

The 17-year-old Benjamin Hannestad is number 58 in the world junior rankings. Despite his age, he was invited to play with the seniors at the Futures tournament in the summer. A couple of weeks before the tournament he received a friend request on Facebook with a profile calling itself “ITF” and used the International Tennis Federation’s logo. With the friend request was the message:

Benjamin Hannested accepted the friend request and gave his details.

“When I got the friend request, I thought it was part of a process for when you play for money. I could see that several I knew had accepted the request,” he says.

When Benjamin Hannestad had played and won his first Futures match, he received a text message on his phone:

Benjamin would get €2,000 before the match and another €2,000 “after the job is done”. A contact person in Copenhagen would give him the money.

“There was no chance I would say yes to the money. That’s not like me at all. I was very surprised to put it mildly. Even though I’d heard it could happen, it was still crazy that I’d get this offer in my first tournament as a senior,” says Benjamin Hannestad, who reported the matter to the TIU, the International Tennis Federation’s investigative unit.

Large sums tempt

But other tennis players at the same level might be tempted. Seniors at the lowest levels struggle to raise the money to travel to tournaments around the world, and the money should be seen in that light. And if you don’t have a big-money sponsor behind you, match fixing can be tempting, says Jens Sejer Andersen, international head of the Play The Game initiative.

“Tennis is a sport a lot of semi and quarter professionals play. There are few who earn big money, while there are many who try. There can be lots of older seniors who can’t earn a living elsewhere and perhaps feel  that tennis is possibly their best chance.  Maybe after a few years they get fatigued and develop a certain cynicism and vulnerability to “the good offer”,” he says.

While match fixing in football/soccer requires that at least goal keeper, a defender and an attacker agree to play according to an agreed pattern, tennis is different. All individual sorts, all things being equal, are more vulnerable to match fixing. All that’s needed in tennis are a few balls into the net.

The women’s winner of the Futures tournament, Mai Grage, also received the offer to lose a set on purpose. She didn’t answer the friend request from the fake profile. She figured out the profile was fake because they had no common friends.

“You hear about match fixing at higher levels, but I was very surprised to hear about it at the lowest international level,” she says.

Translated by @markalannixon