‘Toni Nadal doesn’t want me to play like Rafa,’ Felix Auger Aliassime reveals Uncle Toni’s ‘masterful’ tactics towards his success on Clay
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Felix Auger Alissime and Rafael Nadal
Canadian star Felix Auger Aliassime has been on a constant rise since the last few years. He ended the last season on a high and carried the momentum into the start of this season. He made it to the quarterfinal of the Australian Open where he came ever so close in beating Daniil Medvedev.
He then backed up his solid outing at Melbourne by winning his maiden tour title at Rotterdam where he defeated the likes of Andrey Rublev and Stefanos Tsitsipas. He also made it to the final of the ATP 250 tournament in Marseille before a rather flop outing at the Golden Swing.
At the clay season, he bowed of the Round of 16 of the Grand Prix Hassan 2 and then lost his first match at Monet Carlo to Lorenzo Musetti. Felix started working with Rafael Nadal’s uncle and former coach, Toni Nadal last year. Recently, in an interview, he spoke about the impact Uncle Toni has had on his game.
He spoke about how he doesn’t have the most amazing clay season last year and what different he plans to do this year. “I didn’t have the most amazing clay season last year in terms of results so this year is just an opportunity for me to try to do things better, try to improve on this surface, try to win more matches. So that’s what I’m trying to do,” Felix said.
Felix added that Uncle Toni helps him a lot with getting his game right for clay. He spoke that they’ve been together for more than a year now but at the end, despite all hardships, everything is going into the right direction now.
“It starts with the training, with the work that I’m going to put in every day and Toni helps a lot with that. We talk about the matches and we talk about the game and how I’m supposed to approach the competition. We’ve been together more than a year now so things are doing good, we have good weeks, bad weeks. But in the end the work is great and it’s moving in the right direction,” he said.
‘It’s tough to replicate what Rafa did in his career on clay’: Felix Auger Alissime
Further in the interview, Felix said that despite the success Toni has had with Rafa on Clay, he understands that he isn’t Rafa and realizes how tough will it be to replicate what Rafa has achieved. He said that he’s more of a hard-court player and has different strength, of which clay is not one. He then said that Toni never wants him to play like Rafa and that’s the best part about their partnership.
“I’m not Rafa, we have different qualities, it’s tough to replicate what Rafa did in his career and on clay. I’m more of a hard-court player and I play well on grass as well, it’s different strengths but he has adapted his input. He adapts to the player he’s working with so he’s not approaching it like I want to play like his nephew (Rafa). I think that would be wrong but he has a great knowledge of tennis and he knows a lot so he’s able to help me,” he’s said.
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Lakshya Chopra
(2595 Articles Published)