Фенове на тениса - тема 10

Аз се чудя ей така малко за разнообразие, няма ли поне веднъж Зверев да се падне при Алкарас??? За кой път подред Саша е при Яник?

Today Rafa Jódar played against Jannik Sinner, the world number 1, in the Madrid Open quarterfinals. He lost 6-2, 7-6. He's 19 years old.

And what happened in that second set deserves to be told.

Jódar had 7 break points. Seven chances to break the serve of the best tennis player in the world. Sinner hit a winner on each one. Jódar didn't miss. Sinner responded. Crucial difference.

Sinner took the tie-break 7-0. That's how a match against the number 1 ends when you're 19 years old, you've been a pro for 3 months, and you're playing in the Caja Mágica with Raúl González watching you from the stands.

But what has me hooked on this story isn't the result. It's an image.

The image of his father. Alone. On the bench. With no one else. A whole row of empty seats on either side.

While other tennis players travel with entourages of coaches, trainers, psychologists, nutritionists, managers, and data analysts, Rafa Jódar senior sits there alone. He coaches him. He manages him. He plans the sessions. He decides every step of the career.

And when he gets home, he grades exams. Because he's a Physical Education teacher at a high school in Leganés.

Rafa Jódar junior grew up in Arroyo Culebro, a humble neighborhood in Leganés. Among parks and apartment blocks. No elite academy or sponsors from childhood. He trained at the Club de Tenis Chamartín and went to play at the University of Virginia. In January, he was ranked 166 in the ATP.

Today he's the world number 34. In three months. Just 7 points away from being seeded at Roland Garros.

What he's done in those three months isn't normal. He won the Marrakech ATP 250 — the sixth Spaniard to win an ATP tournament under 20, alongside Nadal, Alcaraz, Moyá, Ferrero, and Robredo. Semifinals at the Barcelona ATP 500. In Madrid, he took out De Miñaur, the world number 8, and Joao Fonseca.

If you watch videos of him in Australia in January and see him today, it feels like 18 months have passed. Not three.

And all this with his father alone on the bench.

"He's been my coach since I was a kid, my manager. We're one. I always look at the box and it's just him. And that makes it very easy."
The father is the one who keeps his feet on the ground. Who reminds him every day that he's still the same kid from Leganés. "So no one thinks I'm anything I'm not."

When Sinner finished the match, he wrote on the camera: "What a player." In the press conference, he said: "Spain has always had incredible players. Now they have one more."

The world number 1 saying that about a 19-year-old kid from Arroyo Culebro who's coached by his father, a high school teacher.