Tennis dads shown new way to behave
When Marinko Lucic, the father of the tennis player Mirjana, was obliged to defend himself against accusations that he had physically assaulted his daughter, his explanation was, to say the least, original.
“I never used excessive force and if I did give her the occasional slap it was because of her behaviour,” he said.
So that is OK then. Meanwhile Damir Dokic, father of Jelena, became renowned on the circuit for outbursts which redefined the term volatile. Like the time he was asked to leave the US Open after getting aggressive with the catering staff about the price of the poached salmon. As for Jim Pierce, we were gifted a sizable clue about his relationship with his daughter Mary after she took out a restraining order against him.
There is something in the power dynamics of producing a top female tennis player, the combination of applied discipline and cold-eyed focus, that brings out the worst in fathers. Interestingly, there are few known incidents of tennis mothers physically terrorising their sons. Jamie and Andy Murray, for instance, have never given the impression of living in fear of their mum Judy.
But even if the dads are not using violence to cajole, tennis history is littered with those who, in the guise of steering their offspring’s career, have taken the opportunity to feather their own nest. Like Peter Graf, who was given a three-year prison sentence for tax evasion that involved improper accounting on some £5.4million of Steffi’s career earnings.
Which brings us to Ian Raducanu, Emma’s old man. Ian certainly does not belong in that rogues’ gallery of overbearing tennis dads, but there is a growing constituency wondering whether his influence on his daughter’s burgeoning career is entirely helpful, especially in light of her early exit from Indian Wells last weekend.
Emma’s habit of going through more coaches than Watford FC – the latest being Andrew Richardson, who was fired within days of guiding her to her US Open win – is understood to be largely down to Ian, a man who has described himself as “tough to please”. And in the enclosed world of professional tennis, they know what that means.
Except in Ian’s case, there is none of the courtside shenanigans that generally identify the overbearing tennis dad. He appeared very calm when his daughter got to the fourth round at Wimbledon and, because of Covid travel restrictions, was not even there when she won the US Open. Actually, compared to many of those stalking the baseline even at club matches, he looks the model, supportive parent.
Yet still the doubts persist. The trouble is, his thinking about what might be best for his daughter is unconventional, unusual, different. And different is often misconstrued as tricky. In the way he has successfully operated in his own world of finance, Raducanu likes to apply a quizzical approach to how Emma might be developed. As Mark Petchey said of him: “His view is that the coach doesn’t necessarily know everything.”
Such scepticism immediately elicits suspicion from the coaching fraternity, whose entire working ethic is based on the assumption that they do know everything. A coach needs to be regarded as omnipotent to ensure their continued employment. Because if they are reckoned to know all the answers, then you cannot do without them.
Ian Raducanu seems to believe that a variety of coaches can each bring different skills. Once those have been absorbed (and Emma is renowned as a very quick learner) then you can move on to the next source of enlightenment. It is, however, not an approach which lends itself to longevity of service.
This is the dilemma faced by the parents of a sporting prodigy. There is a reason those within the system prefer parents merely to serve as their child’s taxi service, keeping schtum on the sidelines, never querying a decision. That way leaves the coaching orthodoxy unchallenged. Ask a few questions, apply a bit of thought, look at things from a different angle and you are reckoned to be an interfering control freak.
You never know, rather than signalling a return to the woeful days of the gruesome tennis dad, Ian Raducanu might just be championing an intriguing new direction.
Compared to many of those stalking the baseline, he looks the model, supportive parent