Emma Raducanu turns to a familiar coach as she plots a return to the top of the game
Emma Raducanu will be starting from scratch when she returns to the court at the start of January and it seems she has returned to a familiar face as her latest coach.
The 2021 US Open champion has come under fire for constantly changing her coach over the course of her brief professional career with Nigel Sears, Andrew Richardson, Torben Beltz and Dmitry Tursunov all working with the 21-year-old over the last couple of years.
She has been out of action since last April and is planning to return in next month’s WTA tournament in Auckland, with her latest coaching appointment seeing her return to a familiar face.
The Daily Mail are reporting that Raducanu will be working with Nick Cavaday as she plots her return to action, with his presence certain to be familiar as they have worked together in her junior days.
Nick Cavaday is a respected coach who was working at the LTA’s National Academy in Loughborough until he stepped away from that role earlier this year.
Cavaday is an LTA Master Performance Coach and has previously overseen the progress of ATP players such as Aljaz Bedene and British Davis Cup winner Dominic Inglot.
He has also enjoyed great success with British players across the whole pathway in singles and doubles at both senior and junior levels.
The National Academy in Loughborough is a hub where the best British players train, with teenager Mimi Xu among the more promising teenagers emerging through the ranks.
Cavaday – whose sister Naomi was a top 200 player in her career – worked with Raducanu in her early days at Bromley Tennis Club and the Mail report suggests they have a long-term relationship with Raducanu’s influential father Ian.
According to Raducanu’s agent Max Eisenbud, Ian plays a crucial role in the key decisions around his daughter, as he confirmed his organisation have little influence on that side of her career.
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“The coaching situation, right or wrong, and this is something that her dad and Emma pretty much control on all the coaching stuff. That has been their philosophy all the way up through the juniors,” Eisenbud told the Tennis Podcast.
“They never had coaches for a long time. You’ve probably heard of that. For them, that is calm waters, having a coach for five months and going on to someone else.
“That is not traditional and not the norm for most to win a Grand Slam and change your coach.
“I think you see players changing coaches all the time, particularly on the women’s tour. I think people have a hard time understanding how you can get to the fourth round of Wimbledon and then how you don’t keep working with Nigel Sears, who is a great coach and a great guy.
“All the people when she stopped working with Nigel were killing her and then she won the US Open.
“You were killing her for not staying with Nigel then she won the US Open. Then she changes coaches again.
“Andrew Richardson was a great guy and a great coach and definitely part of that success, but so was Tim Henman, who was really helping her a lot.
“Quite frankly, her dad was the one putting in a lot of the game plans for the matches. Perspective, it doesn’t look great for people who want it to be wrapped up in a perfect bow. I understand that and I see that, but for the family that’s the way they have done it.
“People need to get over the fact that that’s what they need to do. It’s probably going to be like that for the rest of her career.”
Raducanu has hinted her inquisitiveness could have been an issue for some of the coaches she has worked with
She added: “I ask my coaches a lot of questions. On certain occasions, they haven’t been able to keep up with the questions I’ve asked so maybe that’s why it ended.
“It’s something I’ve always done. I keep provoking and asking questions to coaches and challenging their thinking as well.
“I’m not someone that you can just tell me what do and I’ll do it, I need to understand why and then I’ll do it.”
Raducanu is waiting to discover if she will get a wild card to play in the Australian Open next month, while she might take up the option of going through qualifying in an attempt to play in Melbourne.
