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As the French Open winds towards its weekend conclusion, a face from the past has quietly put forth his dream of returning to tennis five years after handing Rafael Nadal his only loss at Roland Garros. |
Swede Robin Soderling, who last played in July 2011 before stopping due to a case of glandular fever, has told SI.com that he somehow hopes to return to the game where he once competed as a top five regular. He beat Nadal in the 2009 Paris fourth round and lost the final to Roger Federer.
“I haven’t retired,” said the player, who turns 30 in August. “My dream is to come back and give it a try.
“I’ve been playing tennis since I was four, so it’s been tough to go without,” he said. “I look at Tommy Haas, who is in the top 20 and is 36 years old, and it makes me feel more positive.
“I want to quit on my own terms. I want to quit when I feel it’s enough. Right now it’s not enough.”
Soderling, who married and became a father last year, has been taking up light hitting but said he is unable to train full-on without becoming exhausted.
He now works as Stockholm Open tournament director after a mass 2013 cull of organisers at that October indoor event and has developed a line of tennis balls. “As a player, I’d always see tournaments from a player perspective,” he said. “Now I see them from an organisational perspective.”
Since his involuntary exit from the sport, Swedish tennis has crashed and burned, without a player inside the ATP top 350.
MCENROE RULES HIMSELF OUT AS MURRAY COACH
An apparently disappointed John McEnroe has all but ruled himself out as a candidate to coach French Open semi-finalist Andy Murray after floating his own name as new mentor for the seventh-seeded Scot.
With an ego as big as a centre court, the 55-year-old American television commentator and single tennis stalwart, Mac may have thought the Murray camp would make contact.
But so far - radio silence.
As a result, McEnroe seems to have gone cold on the big idea. “If Andy picked up the phone and asked me to coach him, of course I would think about it. But he hasn’t, my cell hasn’t rung,” he said at the French Open in between television commentary duties.
The American may still harbour his long-odds hopes as Murray plays a cat-and-mouse game with media speculation several months after splitting with Mac’s former hated rival Ivan Lendl.
“I haven’t talked to Andy. He would have to speak to me and say he would want me to do it and somehow I don’t see that happening,” said McEnroe. “I guess I’m not the man for the job.”
The betting is on Murray possibly picking a female to guide him, with Amélie Mauresmo and Martina Navratilova being mentioned. “It would be definitely a left-field, unusual turn, but maybe that’s what he needs,” said McEnroe. “You need something to give yourself a shot in the arm, to give yourself that added motivation.”
Murray has been saying for weeks that he will “soon” announce his choice. Some tennis observers believe that he will go into his Wimbledon title defence starting in just over a fortnight without making a decision, as working with a new face could deal a blow to his training routine on the eve of his major tennis date of the season.