Emma Raducanu’s former coach gives the Brit a time frame to become a top player after he leaves
Emma Raducana’s former trainer claimed the Brit is a “two-and-a-half-year project” after he broke up with her. Dmitry Tursunov ended his partnership with the British number one two weeks ago and has since claimed the teenager needs at least a year to become a top player.
Trail is began
Together, Raducanu and Tursunov began trial work on the North American hardcourt swing, with the world No.76 having some success reaching the quarter-finals in Washington and defeating Serena Williams and Victoria Azarenka in Cincinnati.
But the couple announced their split abruptly earlier this month after Raducanu reached her first semi-final in more than a year at the Korea Open. Tursunov has since revealed that he decided to leave after several “red flags” as he claimed he stuck around after their trial to try and impress her team to no avail.
Emma Raducanu needs more improvement
And the former ATP world number 2 has now explained that he saw the 2021 US Open champion as a “project” who would take a year to 30 months to develop into a top player. “In my opinion, it’s at least a one-year project, but I’d say it’s probably a two-and-a-half year project to be sure,” Tennis Majors said.
“This is hard to say and hard for people to understand how it’s possible because she is already won the US Open. But her game is very raw and she could use a lot of improvement in many ways.
Current coach Belinda Bencic also revealed that he told Raducan and her team that she needed one consistent voice to guide her after she developed a reputation for scaling back her coaching in quick succession. Tursunov added: “It’s going to take time, but as I told her and almost everyone on her team: I think it’s enough to have one voice and just try for a while. While the 39-year-old was the one to end her working relationship with Raducanu, he was still full of praise for her play. “But she has a huge advantage: she’s extremely talented, she’s very athletic and very coordinated, so she can deal with some things that other players can’t,” explained Tursunov.
Emma Raducanu needs a perfect coach
“The components are perfect, but you can still screw it up. So it was going to be an exciting project, but a very long-term project, and as a coach, you want to have faith that you’re going to be in the job for that long.
And Ruska echoed his earlier sentiment, admitting that her reputation for firing coaches was difficult to work out before he eventually left. “But of course, given her coaching situation, it’s a thought that crosses every coach’s mind right now,” he admitted.
“So I was really hoping to find a solution so I could continue and that’s why I stayed for a few weeks after the trial period. But in the end, we couldn’t agree on terms so I had to leave and Belinda has nothing to do with it.”