Right here’s a quantity that’ll completely blow your thoughts: out of 128 gamers within the 2025 French Open ladies’s draw, solely 12 have feminine head coaches. Within the males’s draw? Zero. That’s proper – zero male skilled tennis gamers are coached by ladies at one in every of tennis’s greatest tournaments.
For a sport that prides itself on gender equality and breaking limitations, this teaching disparity is downright embarrassing. However the causes behind this stunning imbalance are far more advanced than you would possibly suppose, they usually reveal some uncomfortable truths about skilled tennis.
The unintentional coach who found her true calling
Sandra Zaniewska’s teaching journey completely illustrates how twisted the trail might be for girls in tennis. After retiring as a participant in 2017, she wished completely nothing to do with tennis ever once more. The considered touring the world for another person’s profession appeared like pure torture.
However when her pal Petra Martic wanted momentary assist getting back from damage, Zaniewska reluctantly agreed to a couple weeks of teaching. These weeks changed into months, then years, as Martic climbed from simply inside the highest 100 to quantity 14 on this planet. All of a sudden, the girl who swore off tennis perpetually had discovered her true ardour.
Zaniewska now coaches Marta Kostyuk, at present ranked twenty fifth, however she is aware of her story is extremely uncommon. She calls it “one in a billion,” which tells you every thing about how troublesome it’s for girls to interrupt into skilled teaching.
The invisible limitations that hold ladies out
Nicole Pratt, a former participant turned coach who leads Tennis Australia’s ladies’s teaching initiatives, spent years investigating why so few ladies coach skilled tennis. What she found was an online of interconnected issues that begins with primary self-confidence points.
Many ladies merely don’t imagine they belong in teaching roles, partly as a result of society doesn’t elevate ladies to be as risk-taking or aggressive as boys. When alternatives come up, ladies are much less more likely to communicate up or demand consideration. It’s a vicious cycle that begins in childhood and follows them into skilled careers.
Then there’s the pigeonholing downside. Feminine coaches continuously hear issues like “you’ll work nicely with youthful ladies,” basically limiting their alternatives to work with elite grownup gamers. In the meantime, younger male coaches get employed by prime gamers particularly as a result of they will additionally function hitting companions.
The hitting companion downside no one talks about
Right here’s the place issues get actually irritating. {Most professional} tennis gamers can’t afford separate head coaches and hitting companions, so that they search for coaches who can fill each roles. For the reason that overwhelming majority of gamers desire working towards in opposition to males (who sometimes hit more durable and sooner), male coaches have a built-in benefit.
In line with WTA officers, there are at present zero ladies working as hitting companions on the skilled tour. This creates a transparent pathway for males to enter teaching – they begin as hitting companions, construct relationships, and finally transition into head teaching roles.
It’s mainly a boys’ membership the place ladies can’t even get their foot within the door as a result of they don’t match the bodily necessities of the entry-level place. The irony is painful – in ladies’s tennis, ladies can’t get teaching jobs as a result of they’re not thought-about adequate observe companions.
The household sacrifice that breaks desires
The tour life-style calls for touring 11 months per yr, dwelling out of suitcases, and being obtainable 24/7 to your participant’s wants. For girls who need households or have already got kids, this life-style might be utterly unimaginable.
Pratt herself struggles with this actuality, having 10-year-old twin daughters again in Australia. She tries to restrict her time away to 3 weeks most, however that rule will get stretched continuously. The loneliness and guilt of lacking essential household moments takes a critical toll.
In the meantime, the WTA’s new maternity go away program doesn’t even apply to coaches since they’re basically impartial contractors working for particular person gamers. There’s no security internet, no advantages, and no job safety if life occurs.
The trade lastly wakes as much as the issue
When Billie Jean King known as out the teaching gender hole at Wimbledon in 2023, she wasn’t mincing phrases. With solely six ladies coaches in that match’s foremost draw, she declared the scenario “horrible” and “extraordinarily disappointing.”
The WTA had already launched their Coach Inclusion program in 2021, however King’s public criticism added urgency to addressing this embarrassing disparity. This system now operates throughout a number of areas, taking promising feminine coaches to tournaments and instructing them every thing from reserving observe courts to understanding media necessities.
The outcomes are slowly displaying. On the current Italian Open, about 15% of accredited coaches had been ladies – nonetheless pathetically low, however higher than the one digits from earlier years.
Success tales that show change is feasible
Fanni Varga’s journey reveals what’s doable when ladies get correct help and alternatives. A former faculty coach from Hungary, she joined the inclusion program with out even figuring out if she wished to educate professionally. The expertise opened her eyes to tour life and related her with mentor coaches.
Now she’s working with Danielle Collins, proving that ladies can completely succeed on the highest ranges when given the possibility. Her story highlights what number of gifted ladies are on the market – they only want entry to the precise networks and alternatives.
The options hiding in plain sight
Some fixes appear apparent as soon as you consider them. Match organizers may present designated hitting companions for feminine coaches, eradicating that barrier totally. The WTA may create higher help techniques for coaches who’re moms, possibly permitting household journey stipends or childcare help.
Creating extra entry pathways that don’t require being a hitting companion would additionally assist. The present system basically locks ladies out earlier than they will even attempt teaching professionally.
What gamers are lacking by excluding ladies
Victoria Mboko, the 18-year-old who reached the third spherical at Roland Garros, works with former world quantity 3 Nathalie Tauziat and sees clear benefits. Feminine coaches perceive the ladies’s sport in a different way, relate to the distinctive pressures feminine gamers face, and may present views that male coaches merely can’t provide.
The irony is that ladies’s tennis would possibly truly profit from having extra feminine coaches, however the trade’s structural limitations stop this pure match from occurring.
The small group of ladies at present teaching on the prime degree have fashioned their very own help community, sharing sources and serving to one another navigate tour life. They know they’re pioneers carrying further strain to succeed, not only for themselves however for all the ladies who’ll come after them.
This teaching gender hole isn’t nearly equity – it’s about tennis lacking out on half the potential teaching expertise on this planet. Till the game fixes these systemic limitations, it’s failing each feminine coaches and the gamers who may gain advantage from their experience.