Control the Controllables

Roger Federer will play the final match of his incredible career today at the Laver Cup in London. The 20 time Grand Slam Champion and former World number 1 will team up with his greatest rival Rafael Nadal in the doubles, as Europe take on the rest of the word at the 02 arena. To mark his final farewell to tennis, we´ve brought together these brilliant guests to share their tributes and stories a...

What an amazing two weeks at Flushing Meadows for the 2022 US Open! We have two new US Open Champions, a new world number 1, and we said good bye to the GOAT of the women´s game, Serena Williams. So much to discuss with our panelists, from the old to the new and story lines aplenty in between. Returning to our panel is US pro player and New York native Noah Rubin and Denmark´s Davis Cup Captain Fr...

What an exciting US Open it´s been! As it draws to an end, we´ve taken the chance to speak to former England cricketer Monty Panesar about the trials and tribulations of professional sport.  As you´ll hear, there´s many similarities between professional cricket and tennis.  Monty tells us about his own mental health battles during his career, and the importance of sport specific fitness...

As the final Grand Slam of 2022 gets started, we bring together our amazing panelists to discuss all things US Open. We are joined for the first time on our Grand Slam panel by native New Yorker and ATP Player Noah Rubin who is alongside Mark Hilton, current coach to Sir Andy Murray and ever present former Wimbledon Men´s Doubles Champion and current Danish Davis Cup Captain, Freddie Nielsen. The...

Ken Skupski is one of GB´s most successful doubles players.  After a career spanning 3 decades, he recently retired from pro tennis playing his last match in the Mens Doubles at Wimbledon.  In today´s episode, Ken talks through his career in numbers and in words. From his success in Juniors, to his US College days at Louisiana State University, through to his 18 years on the pro tour, &n...

In today´s episode we speak to ATP Coach and former pro player Neville Godwin. Neville reached a career high of 90 in the world in singles and 57 in doubles during his career, and won the US Open Boys Doubles as a junior in 1993. After retiring he became a coach, helping fellow South African Kevin Anderson to a world top 10 ranking and the US Open final in 2017. Neville won ATP Coach of the Year t...

Wimbledon 2022 was another fantastic event, full of stories and stand out performances. After all the pre-event hype around the ban of Russian and Belarusian players and no ATP/WTA points, the tennis did the talking at SW19. In today´s episode we are joined by some of the players behind those stories, as well as two of our regular Grand Slam panelists:- Mixed Doubles Champions Desirae Krawczyk fro...

Ross Hutchins is a former top 30 doubles player and the Chief Player Officer at the ATP.  He comes from a strong British tennis stock, as the son of Paul Hutchins, former GB Davis Cup captain and British tennis great. Ross won 5 ATP doubles titles during his pro career, reaching 13 ATP Tour doubles finals, and representing Great Britain several times in the Davis Cup. He was ranked 28 in the...

It´s our favourite time of the year, and Wimbledon 2022 has kicked off with a bang! 9 Brits are already through to Round 2, the most since 1997. This year there are more than 60 former and current US College players in the main draw at SW19! In today´s episode we are getting to know 5 GB players who are making their Wimbledon debuts after successful US/UK university careers. Joining CTC Host Dan K...

Jack Draper is one of Great Britain´s hottest up and coming prospects. At 20-years-old he broke into the world´s top 100 ATP rankings last week. It came on the same day that he picked up his first win over a top 20 player, beating Taylor Fritz in the first round at Queens.  Jack sat down with CTC Host Dan Kiernan for the first time, as he prepared for the ATP grass court event in Eastbourne.&...

The 2022 French Open was an historic event. Rafael Nadal won his 14th Roland Garros and 22nd Grand Slam, as he beat Casper Ruud in the final.  Iga Swiatek moved to 35 match wins in a row, and her 2nd French Open title in 3 years as she swept past 18-year-old Coco Gauff in the womens final. More records were broken as Jean Julien Rojer became the oldest male play to win a Grand Slam in the Ope...

We first spoke to Cameron Norrie on the Control the Controllables podcast back in August 2020. He was at the US Open and sat at 76 in the ATP rankings.  Since then, Cameron has won 4 ATP titles including the Masters 1000 in Indian Wells and broke into the top 10 in the world in April.  Today he joins us with his coach Facu Lugones to catch up on Cameron´s amazing run of form since he was...

The second Grand Slam of the season is underway! Can Iga Swiatek build on her 30-match winning streak to win the French Open for a second time? Will it be Djokovic, Nadal or man of the moment Carlos Alcaraz making it through the top half of the mens draw? Or, will we have a surprise finalist? Joining CTC host Dan Kiernan to give their expert opinions on all these questions and more are:- Denmark´s...

Mark ¨Beef¨ Taylor is the Head S&C Coach at Tennis Australia based out of Brisbane. He is better known as fitness coach to former WTA world number 1 Ash Barty, before she shocked the tennis world by quitting the game aged 25 in March. Mark also spent many years working at the LTA (British Tennis Federation) working with players such as Jo Konta and Dan Evans. In this episode, he chats to Dan a...

Dalma Gálfi is a former World junior number 1 and Junior Grand Slam champion. Dalma had a strong start to her Pro career, quickly rising up the WTA rankings to 136 in the world aged just 19. After a challenging 4 years, the 23-year-old from Hungary has just broken into the top 100 for the first time. In this episode, Dalma tells us about the pressures and expectations she faced moving into the pro...

Jofre Porta is one of a handful of tennis coaches who can say they´ve worked with two world number 1 players from a young age. The Spanish coach helped guide Carlos Moya from juniors to top of the ATP rankings, and also worked with Rafael Nadal as a junior. Jofre has previously worked for the Spanish Tennis Federation, he´s been a tennis commentator and is currently the Director of Global Tennis T...

At 14, Josh Sapwell was tipped to be the next Andy Murray. Having won National and European events as a junior, he became the U14 Junior World Champion in 2010, winning the prestigious Orange Bowl event in Miami. Josh was only the 3rd British player to win the boys event. He went on to be a Quarter-Finalist at Junior Wimbledon, but a catalogue of events led to him quitting the sport at the tender...

In today´s episode we´re unpacking the biomechanics of the serve with Dr Mark Kovacs. Known as the number one serve doctor in the world, Dr Mark Kovacs has held a number of roles in elite sport including performance physiologist, sport technology consultant, researcher, coach, speaker and author. You can check out his awesome courses here. A former pro player and NCAA Doubles Champion, Mark has wo...

This episode aims to shine a light on a very different area of tennis: betting and gambling. Tennis is one of the most popular sports to bet on, but match fixing is also an ongoing issue. Dave Pilgrim has over 20 years of experience in the betting industry, and is currently a betting and data expert at Sky Bet. Dave applies that expertise to tennis and has a close lens on how the tennis governing...

In today´s episode we speak to Australian tennis player Matt Reid. Matt has partnered some of the biggest names in Australian tennis during his career, including Nick Kyrgios, Lleyton Hewitt and Bernard Tomic. He has a career high ranking of number 60 in Doubles and 183 in singles. Matt has consistently been part of Australia´s Davis Cup squad as a hitting partner and unofficial mentor to the team...

“It feels like he´s got the momentum right now¨ “There´s been a big shift in momentum in this set¨ “Everything seems to be going against her¨ We hear phrases like these a lot when we watch tennis, and we can feel them when we play. But what really is momentum? In today´s episode we speak to Alistair Higham who is an international expert on matchplay and momentum in sport. Alistair has written onli...

Today is International Women´s Day and what better way to mark it than hearing from one of the most recognisable faces and voices in tennis. Barbara Schett-Eagle reached a career high of number 7 in the world in singles and 8 in doubles, making her the highest ranked Austrian female tennis player of all time. She retired from tennis at the 2005 Australian Open, moving straight into presenting and...

Just a few weeks ago, Ukrainian tennis player Sergiy Stakhovsky was playing the final match of his career at the Australian Open. After nearly 20 years on the tour, the 36-year-old announced his retirement in January, ready to spend more time with his wife and three children. Instead, and despite no military experience, Sergiy has enlisted in the Ukrainian military reserves to defend his country a...

In today´s episode we speak to Piotr Sierzputowski, the former coach of top 5 WTA player Iga Swiatek. Piotr was Iga´s coach from age 15 to 20, guiding her from top junior to a career high of 4 in the WTA rankings.   Iga became the first Polish player to win a Grand Slam title at the 2020 French Open, when she lifted the trophy at just 19-years-old. That same year Piotr was named the WTA Coach...

Dan Smethurst is a British tennis coach and former player who most recently worked with top WTA player Johanna Konta.  A talented youngster, Dan was world junior number 29 before playing on the ITF and ATP Challenger Tour, reaching a career high ranking of 234 in 2014. After quitting tennis he moved into coaching, working with Team Bath Tennis high performance players. Dan was Konta´s assista...