Cash: 'CoCo can still do some damage come hard court season'
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Updated 20/07/2018 at 16:31 GMT
Former Wimbledon champion Pat Cash talks to Eurosport about a major shift in tennis and where his American protégé CoCo Vandeweghe fits amongst the sport's changing landscape ...
Cash: ‘CoCo can still do some damage come hard court season’
Image credit: Eurosport
According to Australian tennis legend Pat Cash, German Angelique Kerber’s (GER) straight set victory over seven-time women’s singles champion Serena Williams at Wimbledon last week to deny the American a record-tying 24th Grand Slam title could soon become the new norm.
“I don’t think we’ll see dominant players for a while, I really don’t,” the 1987 men’s Wimbledon champ told Eurosport. “I think once a few of the top men go as well, we’ll see very much the men and women are about the same in that anybody can win the tournament. We’ve seen that in golf.
When a sporting tour becomes more and more professional and tougher and there are more players, it spreads it out and any person can win and there are loads of different players that can win the majors.
“In the next few years, [Novak] Djokovic, [Andy] Murray, [Roger] Federer and [Rafael] Nadal are going to be gone and we are going to have a whole lot of players coming up and they are going to be very even,” Cash continued. “We are seeing the same thing now in the women’s game and we will see the same in the men.
“It’s just natural progression of players with the depth becoming deeper and deeper. Somebody will come up of course and shine, but I don’t see it happening in the immediate future.”
One such athlete Cash considers a possible threat to the women’s professional ranks is his American protégé CoCo Vandeweghe, whom he has coached since prior to her semi-final run at the US Open last year.
Despite the statuesque 26-year-old New Yorker’s sub-stellar start to 2018, which immediately made headlines in January following a tumultuous tirade at the Australian Open and subsequent illness that kept her off the court for nearly a month, Cash believes the 6-foot-1 power hitter who was forced to withdraw from doubles action at Wimbledon after suffering an ankle injury during her opening round loss to Katerina Siniakova can still “do some damage” come the hard court season.
“Unfortunately CoCo’s had a bad run of luck this year in the majors, but that’s the way it goes,” explained Cash. “She was sick at the Australian Open with a virus that affected several other American players and then she twisted her ankle in her first match at Wimbledon, so that’s disappointing.
“She probably wasn’t in top physical form until the start of the clay court season in late April or early May, to be perfectly honest. CoCo never gets sick and she contracted a terrible virus that really set her back. Following the Australian Open she went back to bed and didn’t do any significant exercise for about a month really.
When she got going in the clay court season in Miami and Indian Wells, she still wasn’t fully fit. She got behind the other girls who had played six or seven tournaments while she had played none, so she was playing catchup and that’s tough.
With a solid set of performances to reach the Stuttgart Open finals, followed by what Cash believes could have been a better French Open outing, Vandeweghe’s mentor is confident of his pupil’s abilities, which he likens to retired American and former world No.1 Lindsay Davenport due to Vandeweghe’s big serve, powerful shots and fierce competitiveness.
“It’s just been a bit of bad luck,” he said. “CoCo feels very confident because she is hitting the ball so well, which is the frustrating part. She did have a great run in Stuttgart and beat four girls in the top 10 — or three girls in the top 10 — which was her breakthrough on the clay and that gave her a lot of confidence that she can play the patient game when need be.
“You get sick or injured and you just have to regroup and come back firing — no way around it,” he added. “Every player gets injured and needs to learn to bounce back and sometimes it takes time.”
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Image credit: Eurosport
With only half a dozen tournaments remaining for Vandeweghe to catch fire and turn her season around, the US Open in August remains a key target for the San Diego resident, who just re-signed with the Aviators and makes her 2018 World TeamTennis debut on July 23.
“That was the aim,” admitted Cash, referring to the upcoming American Grand Slam tournament. “The aim for the year was to keep pushing for the Grand Slam titles, and competing in the second week of the Grand Slam tournaments. CoCo hasn’t had opportunities in two of them.
“The French Open was a little disappointing in that I think she could have tone further, but these things happen on clay. However the US season is good and although she’s behind the eight ball after having not played for three weeks properly coming into a tournament in which she reached the [semifinals] last year, she’s hitting the ball well enough to beat anybody — and she knows she can literally beat any person on the tour at any time — and everybody knows that too.
CoCo can be a terrible person to meet first or second round for any of these top players.
With improved consistency and a sharper mental focus, the 2008 Junior US Open champion is steps ahead of her game a year ago, however Cash remains cautious of the sport’s current landscape and Vandeweghe’s road to reclimb the rankings from 19th to her career best ninth earlier this year (January 15).
“She’s progressing and making great improvements in the last nine months to a year,” he explained. “She needs to keep working because as I said there are no easy matches anymore.
“You can see how it’s gone this year,” Cash concluded. “Anybody in the top 30 or even top 40 can progress to a quarterfinal or semi of a Grand Slam or premier tournament. We’ve seen some very unusual matchups in the last year and it’s been incredibly even.
“You can’t have a bad day, otherwise you end up out on your ass.”
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