"I'm not Rafa, but Toni Nadal has been a great help" says Felix Auger-Aliassime
ATP
In April 2021, Felix Auger-Aliassime hired Toni Nadal as his full-time coach, and after a year, the young Canadian spoke about how their partnership has been so far.
Over the years, clay looked like the weakest surface for Auger-Aliassime. In the 2020 ATP season, the Canadian won only 1 out of 4 matches he played on the red dirt, and so ahead of the 2021 clay-court season, he has decided to appoint a coach of the most successful clay-court player ever, the uncle of Rafael Nadal, Toni Nadal.
However, Auger-Aliassime ended the 2021 season with only 4 matches won on clay from 10 he played. And now, in the 2022 season, he has lost 2 out of 3 he has played so far.
With the clay-court season coming to a vital conclusion ahead of the Roland Garros, it remains a question if Toni Nadal can help Auger-Aliassime improve his clay-court results.
"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."
"It starts with the training, it starts with the work that I’m going to put in everyday 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 matches and the competition."
The young Canadian noted the presence of the new coach. Auger-Aliassime appreciates Nadal's help, but he also recognizes that he's much different than Toni's previous protege, his nephew Rafa.
"He’s been a great help of course, we’ve been together more than a year now so things are doing good, we have good weeks, bad weeks – but at the end the work is great and it’s moving in the right direction."
"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 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, 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."
Auger-Aliassime will play in the 2022 Barcelona Open, where he's the third seed, and will play Carlos Taberner, who defeated Sebastian Korda in the first round of the ATP 500 tournament.
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