Parents play a pivotal role in encouraging and supporting their child's participation, success and fun when playing tennis. Therefore, it is absolutely essential that coaches and parents communicate regularly so that both are working towards the same process and goals.
Problems arise when Parents and coaches process and goals are not aligned. This leads to inconsistencies, confusion, and frustration that never aid a player’s development.
There is a myth in tennis development that all you need to do to become a great player is play a massive amount of matches and tournaments. If only it were that easy. We’d all be churning out Grand Slam champions every year!
Tennis is a complex highly skilled sport and it takes a lot of time, hard work, resilience, drive, passion and know how to navigate through the levels. This is why the Parents' role is so important.
A junior match places the player in a fully responsible position. When a 12 yr old goes onto a tennis court, they are expected to deal with all aspects of being alone in a 'battle environment'. They need maturity, restraint, to be a strategy master, a skill master and act as judge and jury whilst under pressure.
The children need the love support and understanding from the parents to help them achieve and enjoy the challenges that tennis will throw at them. It is not just the children that learn the game of tennis it is the parents also. For, if they do not understand the game, then they cannot help support the child’s development along the way.
So, learning tennis is a long journey with many twists and turns. Most of all it should be an enjoyable process. There are no short-cuts to becoming a rounded player with all the facets needed to perform.
Always remember - you can't push water - it will flow at it's own pace and arrive at the same destination
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