Why can't the British win any grand slams?

Anaconda

Hall of Fame
Because we haven't produced anyone who actually has the game to win slams. Tim henman didn't have much game, he had very good volleys and movement but outside that he had nothing going for him. He was also fragile upstairs in the head and couldn't close out matches for his life. He was also scared of losing; he didn't have the gut to take chances on big points like the best slam champions of today (Federer and Nadal) do. He was just incapeable of winning.

Murray is the current hope who also doesn't have the game to win slams. He will win at least one slam in the next few years when the era gets really weak (Nad's will retire in a few years, JMDP and Djokovic will take most but Murray will have to live off the scraps given to him by the superior opposition). If he fails to claim a slam it would be awful; He's what, been favourite for the last 2 years in the slams and still hasn't even won a set in a final yet.





At the end of the day, no matter who we produce other countries will better us. Like i said, i think Murray will win a slam but that's about it. There is no way he's making slam finals year in year out he doesn't play aggressive enough and he is bound to play someone on a day where his opponment is hitting lines with everything.

I mean American's complain about how no one has took the mantle from Agassi and Sampras but in all seriousness, they have one contender who has actually proved himself and has won a slam and lost to one of the all time greats. That's like a fail in the USA where a player with limited skill wins a slam + 4 finals.

In other words, USA's fail players - like Roddick will probably have a better career than our best player ever which is Murray. It's sad.
 

Anaconda

Hall of Fame
Exactly. Murray is our best hope. That is a dead giveaway that British tennis is really down in the dumps. Our british #2 has been given wildcard after wildcard at Wimbledon and still hasn't even made the round of 64 yet.

Even if Federer wasn't around, Murray still wouldn't have a slam to his name and the same can be said for Henman with Sampras. So if anyone makes excuses they are wrong because they aren't good enough to be given slams at the expense of a player who wasn't born.
 

dlk

Hall of Fame
What is youth tennis in the UK like? Is it on it's way up, stagnet, or improving? Since my ancestry is from Scotland & England, I've always had high regards for the UK (especially cause they got the US's back). And essentially, the US is an offshoot of the Empire. Murray is the only British player I know; anyone on the climb?
 

spaceman_spiff

Hall of Fame
As an American living in the UK (4 years now), my opinion is that the two major reasons for failure are your courts and your coaches.

Most clubs have all-weather courts (carpet with sand on them), which play nothing like any courts used in professional tournaments. At best, they can almost simulate grass, which is by far the least used surface for ATP tournaments. They also tend to throw up a lot of unpredictable bounces, which prevent kids from learning to successfully hit on the rise or return serve aggressively.

Those clubs that have hard courts can't play too often because of the constant rain. So, the only people who get constant training on good courts are those whose clubs have indoor facilities, which limits the talent pool quite a lot.

On top of that, the coaching I've seen around here sucks. I got better coaching when I was a teenager from cheap group lessons than I see the kids around here getting from private lessons. The number of juniors at my club with major flaws in their serves despite all the coaching I've seen them get these 4 years is frankly appalling. They have major hitches and other problems that the coaches allow to continue year after year.

Having seen some of the crap players from my club who have been able to get their LTA coaching certificates, I'm not surprized. We have one guy who is certified despite not knowing how to serve properly (he uses a forehand grip on a push serve like a begginer), amongst other things; of course he won't be able to teach a kid how to play well. We also have a lady who can't volley to save her life and struggles to sustain a decent rally. How good of a coach is that?


So, in my opinion, you've got two options.

1. Send all your kids to Spain like Dandy Andy
2. Fire all your coaches and replace all your all-weather courts with hard or clay courts and put up roofs, tents, or some sort of cover over them to block the rain. They don't need to be fully enclosed indoor courts; they just need to be dry.
 

5th Element

Rookie
spaceman_spiff is outspoken and politically incorrect...

And I admire these two qualities :)

He's correct too. I've done the LTA's DCA qualification (although it was more than 5 years ago and it's changed quite a bit since then) as well as the PTR's.

I appreciated the LTA's game-based approach and coming from a tactical perspective, but there was very little emphasis on error detection and correct technique. I saw some people get their certificates who clearly shouldn't. I am not a super player myself but when it comes to demonstrating good technique, I believe there's no room for personal style in the early stages of someone's development. Everytime I hear a coach say 'your serve is something personal and no one should tell you how to do it' I get furious!! And that's why you have wrong grips, feet moving, low elbow, bad toss, etc.

I will never forget the final day of my DCA qualification when a guy showed up for a re-test and the examiner asked him to find something on my serve to work with for half an hour. You know what he did? Asked me to serve underarm to get a feel for slicing the ball. The examiner says to him 'your student can clearly serve properly, are you sure you haven't regrressed too much?' Answer: No!. 20 minutes later he passed his exam. Dear oh dear :)

As for Murray, as good as he is I think he's not even close to winning a slam. He's 6-0 sets in GS finals and got there having had easy-ish draws. My prediction is that he won't win a slam unless we get a repeat of 2001-2003 - the dark days of tennis.
 

spaceman_spiff

Hall of Fame
I will never forget the final day of my DCA qualification when a guy showed up for a re-test and the examiner asked him to find something on my serve to work with for half an hour. You know what he did? Asked me to serve underarm to get a feel for slicing the ball. The examiner says to him 'your student can clearly serve properly, are you sure you haven't regrressed too much?' Answer: No!. 20 minutes later he passed his exam. Dear oh dear :)

That reminds me, I've also seen examples where coaches in the UK went too far with changes. There were a couple of younger players at nearby clubs who had odd backswings on their serves but still did all the fundamentals (trophy position, shoulder turn, knee bend, etc.). They looked a bit strange, but they served solidly and consistently.

For some reason, instead of focusing on the weaknesses in their games, their coaches decided to change their serves to look more like the textbook (long, loopy backswing). Now, well over a year later, both still struggle to serve because they're so focused on their backswing they can't toss the ball right or get their timing right. Even when they do hit a good serve, it's no better than anything they used to do with their old techniques.

Two different players at two different clubs had their serves destroyed because their coaches felt the need to change things that were perfectly fine (if not pretty).

Compare that to the coaches in my hometown. I have a fairly straight takeback, somewhat similar to Roddick, which doesn't look pretty, but no one ever made me change it to look more like the textbook. They made loads of other necessary changes to my game, but they didn't mess with things that worked perfectly fine regardless of how they looked.
 

Peters

Professional
There are many tennis fans in the UK, and we love watching Wimbledon, but quite simply there is very little interest in taking up the sport in this country and the LTA is very poorly-run.

Go to any typical school in the UK and tennis will nearly always be last on the list of preferred sports to take up - that's if you have parents who can afford the extra cost of attempting to seriously get you training properly.

Take my sports-mad 9 year old nephew for example; he's into rugby, cricket & football. I don't think he even has the option of taking up a racquet sport - it's completely off the radar in most schools (for the average child). Most parents wouldn't even know where to begin getting their child into a tennis centre, but then it's irrelevant if the child him/herself isn't interested in the first place.

When you put all that together you have a very small pool of players to develop into professional tennis players. Smaller group, less 'stand-out' players, less stand-out players, less chance of finding one with potential to ultimately win a slam.

..

Also, enough with the Murray bashing. He has the game to win slams, he was by far the 2nd-best player in the AO. 3rd best was beyond the horizon. It's true Federer is his nemesis, but I'm pretty sure they'll be plenty more opportunities for Murray to get a GS.

Comparing his chances to that of Henman is ridiculous.
 

crosscourt

Professional
What 5thelement says is very interesting. I live in London and have been trying to find a good technical coach for the serve. It is very difficult to find anyone who seems to know how to coach the stroke -- beyond telling you to grip the racket lightly, have a throwing motion and so on.

cc
 

VicSpie

New User
Most of you guys should be newspaper reporters! I think you have hit the nail on the head Peters/Spaceman Spiff. And there isn't enough sport in schools as it is - but tennis in particular is only played during a few months of the year. Well let's hope Andy Murray can do something.
 

5th Element

Rookie
Crosscourt, for the avoidance of doubt I'm not saying that all LTA coaches are bad. All am saying is that there are a lot that aren't. I'd say from experience that for every 4 good ones you'll come across 1 poor and 1 average. Do the maths and that's a lot of bad coaches! I'm happy I've also done the PTR and attended one of their many seminars (in fact one event coming up at the end of this month featuring several world class coaches). Their approach to technical error detection is excellent.
 
Mother Marjorie says that as grass-court tennis has waned in the grand slam events and tour events, so has Great Britain's ability to win on any surface.
 

davey25

Banned
Even if Federer wasn't around, Murray still wouldn't have a slam to his name

Who was going to beat him at the Australian Open this year without Federer? U.S Open 2008 I could see as debateable, but even there he has a great head to head with Djokovic since mid 2008.
 

devila

Banned
Men's tennis has players in severe denial. Everyone knew that this decade is full of the weakest players in history.
Everyone wanted to believe that Roddick was the worst but the British cried when Roddick finally stopped choking against Murray.
Roddick listened to the liars & bursted into tears for the media to witness him 'getting emotional over a lucky win'. Again, the Federer worship made everyone bow down & cry like clowns. No opponent took responsibility for their own lack of commitment to tennis. Same vicious cycle..boring mess.
 

defrule

Professional
As an American living in the UK (4 years now), my opinion is that the two major reasons for failure are your courts and your coaches.

Most clubs have all-weather courts (carpet with sand on them), which play nothing like any courts used in professional tournaments. At best, they can almost simulate grass, which is by far the least used surface for ATP tournaments. They also tend to throw up a lot of unpredictable bounces, which prevent kids from learning to successfully hit on the rise or return serve aggressively.

Those clubs that have hard courts can't play too often because of the constant rain. So, the only people who get constant training on good courts are those whose clubs have indoor facilities, which limits the talent pool quite a lot.

On top of that, the coaching I've seen around here sucks. I got better coaching when I was a teenager from cheap group lessons than I see the kids around here getting from private lessons. The number of juniors at my club with major flaws in their serves despite all the coaching I've seen them get these 4 years is frankly appalling. They have major hitches and other problems that the coaches allow to continue year after year.

Having seen some of the crap players from my club who have been able to get their LTA coaching certificates, I'm not surprized. We have one guy who is certified despite not knowing how to serve properly (he uses a forehand grip on a push serve like a begginer), amongst other things; of course he won't be able to teach a kid how to play well. We also have a lady who can't volley to save her life and struggles to sustain a decent rally. How good of a coach is that?


So, in my opinion, you've got two options.

1. Send all your kids to Spain like Dandy Andy
2. Fire all your coaches and replace all your all-weather courts with hard or clay courts and put up roofs, tents, or some sort of cover over them to block the rain. They don't need to be fully enclosed indoor courts; they just need to be dry.

You have nailed it precisely!
 

yellowoctopus

Professional
My humble suggestion is to be patient. The truth is for the past five years, the combination of Nadal and Federer has made GrandSlam titles next to impossible to get. Roddick, Murray, Djokovic and alikes should have had or add to their GrandSlam titles, but we live in the time of two greats, one possibly the greatest in the history.
federer_nadal_clw_nq_05_590.jpg
 
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