Bulgarian tennis player Grigor Dimitrov has identified were the problems were in his game that led to a poor 2016 season.
After reaching the Wimbledon semi-finals in 2013 much had been expected of Dimitrov, but he struggled to replicate that form in the following years despite working with some premier names in coaching such as Roger Rasheed, who coached Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, and Franco Davin, former coach of Juan Martin del Potro.
Yet speaking wit NOVA, Dimitrov acknowledged that the problem lay with him. “”There were moments in which I could not pull myself together, I couldn’t focus, I couldn’t do my training in a way that would have been beneficial to me,”.
Yet since adding Dani Valverdu, who has worked with players including Andy Murray and Tomas Berdych in the past, Dimitrov seems to have turned a corner. He has won the Brisbane International to start the year, defeating the likes of Milos Raonic and Kei Nishikori. He then followed this up by taking Rafael Nadal to five sets in the Australian Open semi-finals. The Bulgarian is well aware of the impact that Valverdu has had on his game, and the seamless way that he has slotted into his team.
”When you don’t have a stable team, it is very hard to have persistence, I didn’t want just to have a coach, but to find something valueble, to find the right person. We get along [with Vallverdu], we can be on the same page.”
