'Part of their history': inside the Touring Team, the coach's view
Hogging the limelight in recent days has been the Grand Slam Player Development Programme/ITF Touring Team as the countdown to the tour of South America, which begins with a training camp in Asuncion on Thursday, continues.
The tour of South America follows the opening trip of 2023 to Australia, which culminated in all eight players competing at the Australian Open Junior Championships, with four of those on show in Melbourne also travelling to Paraguay and Brazil.
The three-week South American tour will see members of the team compete in both singles and doubles at two ITF World Tennis Tour J300 events, at Asuncion and Porto Alegre, before attention turns to J500 Criciuma.
During that time, as well as gaining exposure to a high level of competition – for the majority, this will be outside of their home region – players, all of whom are aged 18 and under, will have access to high-performance coaches.
Leading the tour in terms of coaching is Leandro Afini and Bettina Fulco, who will work with the players on a daily basis and impart as much wisdom as possible within the framework of their existing coaching programmes.
Incidentally, Touring Team coaches now utilise an athlete management system, which acts as a central hub to store all information related to players in the programme and is vital for analysis and reporting.
It enables coaches to gather information from players' private coaches as well as past Touring Team coaches to ensure a smooth transition in their ongoing development.
“We are here to help them as much as we can," Afini tells itftennis.com. “It is a short period we will be with these players, but we will try to make a positive impact on their careers.
“When you meet players two or three years after they were members of the Touring Team, they always come and talk. They always have memories of the team, the coaches and all the things they learned on the tour.
“It is very satisfying and a pleasure to know that in some way you have been a part of their history, and you in turn are always hoping and cheering for them to be the best they can be.”
The intention is always for the Touring Team to grow and develop off court
While the intention is for the Touring Team to play a key role in a player’s progression towards the game’s professional ranks, regardless of career trajectory there are all-encompassing, holistic, benefits to this developmental initiative.
Funded by the Grand Slam Player Development Programme, the Touring Team arms aspiring players with skills for life on and off court, something reinforced by Mercedes Sullivan in a recent interview with itftennis.com.
Sullivan is now a high-flyer within corporate America but insists the skills she acquired and the experiences she had while a member of the Touring Team back in 1995 have been pivotal to her success in a industry very different to tennis.
“Players gain so much off-court from every tour,” said Afini. “They will be working with different coaches and will learn new things, especially in South America because the majority of the team are from Europe or Asia and it is a different culture here.
“As tennis players, they will learn much because of the different playing conditions, but outside of the court they are going to progress as people and human beings because it will be so different to what they are used to.
“Whatever they end up doing, the players will forever take the next few weeks in their lives.”
This is a sentiment echoed by Roberta Burzagli, who has coached the Touring Team for the best part of two decades and was one of two coaches, the other being James Connelly, to accompany the team to Australia in January.
“The skills and experiences from these tours set people up for life, they are life-changing,” Burzagli tells itftennis.com. “I am still in contact with many players who were on teams that I have coached, and not just those still in tennis.
“Whether they are in a good moment or struggling, they always say how much they appreciate the Touring Team programme and how much they learnt. They always remember their time with the team.”
Burzagli coaching in Melbourne
The four players selected to travel to South America who also toured Australia are Adriano Dzhenev (BUL), Madeleine Jessup (TPE), Tania Andrade Sabando (ECU) and Malwina Rowinska (POL). Unfortunately, Matej Dodig (CRO) has been forced to withdraw from the tour through injury.
Burzagli is ideally placed to provide some inside information on these players, but also snippets from the Australia tour, which saw Bulgaria’s Iliyan Radulov, who is not travelling to South America, reach the Australian Open Junior Championships quarter-final.
“It is such a shame for Matej as he is a really good player," said Burzagli. "He actually got food poisoning in Australia and was in hospital for a time and couldn’t play the first week.
“He knows the name of everybody and how they play – he is really into that. He knows his junior opponents and has studied them but also the professionals. He knows everything, he loves tennis and is constantly reading about the game and watching matches.
“Adriano, meanwhile, loves to practice. He practices all day long and is very professional, while on the girls’ side, Malwina is very talkative, she is always smiling, she is very fashionable and likes to dress well.
“Madeleine is learning to speak Spanish online and Tania proved an excellent teacher, especially during the second week of the tour when they started rooming together. Tania, who is from Ecuador, was all the time trying to teach her, which was a lovely addition to the tour."
Focus now switches to South America and the scene is set for the latest instalment of a key development initiative, with immeasurable growth – on and off court – set to take place.
It is impossible to say what lies ahead for these players, but safe to say the next few weeks are likely to be remembered for some time to come.