Stefanos Tsitsipas appears to criticise Goran Ivanisevic as he makes ‘anxiety’ comment
Stefanos Tsitsipas has aimed a dig at his former coach Goran Ivanisevic and suggested there was “anxiety” when the Croatian was a member of his team.
The former world No 3 was coached by Ivanisevic during the grass-court season last year, with pair’s short and seemingly tumultuous partnership ending in July.
After Tsitsipas retired in his opening round match at Wimbledon, Ivanisevic publicly and bluntly criticised Tsitsipas’ lack of preparation.
“He wants to, but he doesn’t do anything. All, ‘I want, I want’, but I don’t see any progress,” the former world No 2 told Sport Klub.
“I was shocked, I’ve never seen a more unprepared player in my life. With this knee, I’m three times more prepared than him. This is really bad.”
Ivanisevic, who started working with French star Arthur Fils this month, is highly regarded on the ATP Tour for his success coaching Novak Djokovic and Marin Cilic.
The 2001 Wimbledon champion coached his Croatian compatriot Cilic to his only Grand Slam title at the 2014 US Open before helping Djokovic win nine majors between 2019 and 2024.
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Tsitsipas is now coached by his father Apostolos, who he split with for a spell in 2024 and 2025, and also Dimitris Chatzinikolaou, Greece’s Davis Cup captain.
The Greek is set to drop outside the top 40 in the ATP Rankings after his Dubai Championships title defence ended with an opening round defeat on Tuesday.
Speaking to The National in Dubai, Tsitsipas described his time working with Ivanisevic as a “brief but intense experience” and seemed to criticise the Croat’s ability as a coach.
“I feel homey with my team,” the 27-year-old said. “I feel like they belong exactly where they’re at. And I feel like there’s no anxiety around my team. There was a period where there was anxiety. New faces, new members were added.
“And it created a lot of confusion instead of clarity. I regret certain decisions that I jumped into and took based on performance of their own in the past and stuff like that.
“What I’ve learnt through it is it doesn’t mean if you’re a good tennis player, if you played good tennis in your life, you can be a good coach.
“That’s what I’ve learnt from this whole process. And sometimes you got people that are right for you that weren’t necessarily the best players in the world, weren’t necessarily Grand Slam winners, weren’t necessarily legends of the sport.
“So these type of people sometimes can bring the best out of you instead of people that have a certain status in the game.”
The two-time Grand Slam finalist added: “People that pretend they know it all and people that have this sort of persona that, ‘I’m in charge and I know how things work’, I don’t really enjoy that.
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