Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

A new subforum created to discuss Sania Mirza. As a lot of the other tennis player threads were getting overloaded, thus a new forum to discuss Sania Mirza

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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by puneets »

What does she get for all of that? .. Accusations after accusations of being the "bad girl". 
The irony of it all, is striking.
If you go by the media reports, then she gets a stronger brand name after all this. It has been reported in a lot of papers that "Brand Sania is still at the very top".

There wouldn't have been accusations if had she withdrawn because of an injury. The reasons she gave for her withdrawal are the main cause of these accusations.

Yes, the irony is indeed striking. On one hand, this kid is so motivated to play for India (and the Indian people) that she is ready to risk an injury BUT on the other hand, she is not ready to play in INDIA (in front of Indian people).
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by jai_in_canada »

There is a thin line that separates heroism and stupidity.  If she prevented India from relegation in Fed Cup, but has introduced another body part to being injury-prone long term, I would not call her decision in Hong Kong smart or heroic.  If she was injured during a match and chose to fight through to completion, I admire that.  But to take to the court with a pre-existing serious injury is ill-advised, to put it mildly.
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by shibi »

Sania Mirza has (temporarily) hired the services of top tennis coach Sven Groeneveld, who is also coaching Ana Ivanovic. Groeneveld, who has almost two decades of international coaching experience behind him, has worked with Mary Pierce, Michael Stich, Greg Rusedski and Nicolas Kiefer among others in the past. He’ll work with Sania for 15 weeks during the course of the year.

Groeneveld Sania's new coach
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by amr090 »

http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/tennis ... id=3300751


Analysis on the main espn tennis site about Sania's game........
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by jayakris »

"If she'd spend just a few weeks learning to shorten the backswing on her forehand, she'd be that much more efficient, consistent and every bit as powerful," said Andy Fitzell, a Utah-based tennis coach and researcher here conducting extensive video analysis of all pros.
In other words, he wants to change her forehand to what others do, right? (Contrast with what v.george said in the sania tournament thread) .. No thank you, I say.

I have always held that Indian coaches not being able to figure her out and make her fit the usual mould like the US coaches would, was a big reason that made Sania what she is now....  I may be wrong, of course, as always.
Fitzell also believes Mirza's serve handicaps her. "That high toss causes her to stop the kinetic chain of motion and not really accelerate as much as you'd like," he said.
No idea about this item....
Added to those technical issues is a bit of inexperience in crunch time. With Hantuchova serving down 5-4 in the second set, love-15 in the game, Mirza created a good chance to come to the net, but struck the approach shot poorly and did an even worse job on the follow-up volley, losing the point and a golden opportunity to possibly level the match.
Interesting that Joel Drucker picked that point that I too felt was THE key point.  I explained in detail in the match report.  I think he is making too much of it though.  SM simply picked a spot to hit the approach shot which was wrong.  At another time she would have hit it to Daniela's backhand side...  But then again, against most players below top-10, that shot would not have come back, and so perhaps he has a point that she needs more experience at this level.

I am glad to see the report anyway.  How often have you seen a player who lost 16 67 get such coverage on ESPN? .. But that is why Sania's special.

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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by Atithee »

jayakris wrote: I am glad to see the report anyway.  How often have you seen a player who lost 16 67 get such coverage on ESPN? .. But that is why Sania's special.
Jay, I have to disagree with you here.  Sania is getting the coverage not because she is special.  She is getting coverage because she is a woman from India (throw in all the stereotypes about India and Indian women in general).  If she were from Russia, with exactly the same game and forehand, I would bet that she would not get the same coverage or attention.  In fact, of the four featured in this assessment: Tsonga, Murray, and Mirza are getting coverage because they represent a rare success in France, England, and India, respectively.  Dani may be an exception in this column but if you look at it, she's perhaps representing Slovakia in the same vein (I am not too familiar with all the female Slovak players).  However, I think Dani was mentioned in this column because she is one who was always marked as being destined for a top-10 rank but has largely failed to realize that potential (mostly due to mental issues in my opinion).  Sania, in spite of the wide spread international coverage, was rarely spoken in those terms except by some of us in this forum and Indians in general (yes, I do remember Serena commenting on her Top-10 potential but what else do you expect her to say while on her first trip to India?).

Let me also assert here that before we talk about a Top-10 ranking for Sania, let her beat one of the Ivanovic, Williams sisters, Sharapova, Chakvetadze, Henin, or Jankovic even once.  Let her reach at least the quarters of one grand slam.  Heck, I'd even take a Bartoli, Vaidisova, or Hantuchova, or even Kuznetsova (again).  And then, she has to do it consistently (at least 25 - 50 per cent of the meetings).  Hingis, Peer, Zvonareva etc. count for much less irrespective of their ranking. 

Overall, the talk about the improvements this season is no indication of her crossing the plateau she has been unable to in the past years.  Add the recurrent injuries, controversies, age, constant flow of eastern European players (heck, even Chinese), and, above all, inability to produce stellar results on all surfaces to the mix, and the situation looks even more bleak.

However, hope is eternal.  Plus, she has already done for India what no sportswoman has done before.
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by amr090 »

Athithee, I disagree she is getting the coverage because shes a woman from India.  If you go to the main tennis page of that article, it generally lists the 4 players Drucker feel have untapped/unrealized potential, and in his opinion Sania is one of those players. 

I think top 20 is really an achievable goal for her this year if she can stay healthy.  I think that continues to be her biggest problem....she is definitely playing smarter tennis now and not going for broke senselessy...her movement seems to have improved some bit, and she plays more tactical tennis.  The biggest worry for me is the latest news about her wrist.  I feel if she gets injured and misses a long time out, she will again be back to the drawing board.  she needs a full consistent healthy year, and i think she can definitely close on the top 20.
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by Atithee »

Arun,

My argument is about a Top 10 ranking only and specifically if even the visible improvements have enabled her to crack the elite group that she has been so close yet so far to for at least two years now.  A big part of joining those ranks and staying in it is fitness and injury management too.  It is sad that injuries continue to plague her progress; nonetheless, they remain a deterrent in her quest, and a cause for me to not be so bullish in spite of my fervent hope.

For the reason she gets attention -- Let us just agree to disagree.

Thanks.
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by amr090 »

I agree with you completely about the top 10 echelon...I agree she is currently nowhere near the top 10 or even top 15.  In my view she is approaching the top 20-25 now if she can remain healthy and continue to maintain form.  With the clay season coming up if she even goes reasonably deep in tournaments her ranking will rise because she has almost no points to defend on clay.  Furthermore, I think just based on her game play, she is playing much smarter than years past.  She seems to have learned when to go for broke and when not to while still maintaining her overall aggressive tone to matches.  It's just now she goes for foolish shots a lot less.  I think she has improved tactically.  We need to wait and see about her healthy. 


I do agree she does get a ton of attention due to the stereotyped western media acting like India is in the dark ages and somehow she has come out of it to play tennis.  However, I did feel that in the particular link I posted, it seemed to be more due to Drucker's impressions about her potential and game as opposed to her ethnicitiy.

Anyways, let us see what happens...my main concern is that there is no serious injury and she can stay healthy for the whole year.
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by Prashant »

jayakris wrote:
Fitzell also believes Mirza's serve handicaps her. "That high toss causes her to stop the kinetic chain of motion and not really accelerate as much as you'd like," he said.
No idea about this item....
That's an interesting opinion. Certainly there have been excellent servers with a very high toss - Stefi Graf had probably the highest toss of any pro in the middle of her career. In general, I've seen shorter players benefit from a higher toss because they can 'wind' more. Contrast with the very tall Ivanisevic who could toss the ball 6 inches & still give it a good whack. Very anecdotal of course, but I don't buy Fitzell's assessment.
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by jai_in_canada »

I think Sania being an Indian and a Muslim at that has played a part in the coverage previously.  But in this particular case I think the coverage is because her brand of tennis is just gosh-darned exciting and entertaining in the other wise somnolent world of WTA.  I think Tsonga is also covered because he generates so much excitement and has so much charisma.

With regards to the free advice contained in the article, you get what you pay for so I am skeptical about the author's analysis.  But he may have a point about the serve - not so much the toss but the fact the kinetic motion is broken up mid sequence.
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by Atithee »

jai_in_canada wrote: I think Sania being an Indian and a Muslim at that has played a part in the coverage previously.  But in this particular case I think the coverage is because her brand of tennis is just gosh-darned exciting and entertaining in the other wise somnolent world of WTA.  I think Tsonga is also covered because he generates so much excitement and has so much charisma.
However, aren't Dani and Murray in the same article an antithesis of this notion?
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by jayakris »

Atithee,

I think you missed my point, probably by the careless way I put it, when I said, "How often have you seen a player who lost 16 67 get such coverage on ESPN? .. But that is why Sania's special"...

I was not talking about her being special in any general way, on the basis of the totality of her career or anything - which is still asking for a lot more to be proved.  I was only hinting at her being rather unique in her weapon shot, and her attitude to hit it at any time.   That did impress Joe Drucker, and that is what caused him to write about her right after a nothing-to-write-home-about 16 67 loss.  I really believe that in THIS particular case, this scribe wrote about Sania because he was really impressed, despite the loss.   It is a fact that her shot *is* special, because I have now heard it from so many expert sources, that I do not doubt it.

I do not agree that if a Russian or American had the same shot they would not get the same attention.  They would, if they have a weapon that many think is the BEST EVER in the history (some even murmer reluctantly these days that even Steffi Graf did not have as unique a forehand).   There are indeed quite a few tennis experts you could meet at tournaments who would simply rave about her.  More interestingly,  many have seen her only in some losses here and there, but they seem to have still come away impressed at those 2 or 3 shots she hits in the match.   The shots even sounds totally different on court than what any of them have seen.  In this particular case, I tend to believe that the Writer chose to focus on her and select her among "four players with the potential for even more in 2008," as he said, on the basis of sme special items in her game, rather than because she was Indian or Muslim or woman.

As for general attention to her and all the stuff in world press on her, and about what causes that, the rest of what you say above is nothing I disagree with.

Jay
Last edited by jayakris on Thu Mar 20, 2008 5:17 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by genius »

Atithee wrote:   She is getting coverage because she is a woman from India (throw in all the stereotypes about India and Indian women in general). 
Poor real world commonsense. Mediocre players barely get any coverage anywhere because noone is really interested in them barring a select circle of friends or a few supporters like this forum. And to get coverage in the international media takes even more.

and when did nirupuma and even leander get this coverage?

the key word is she is a top prospect and from india,That's how it works. even if she had the talent of a dechy or schiavone, she wont't get too much coverage.

Its players who have something in them, who get any sort of international hype- radwanska,peer,szavay and ana,vaidisova(who have graduated to a different level now). the fact that she is from india highlight it a bit more slightly.
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Re: Sania - Conditioning, Foot Speed, Mobility and Coaching ..

Post by genius »

Atithee wrote: In fact, of the four featured in this assessment: Tsonga, Murray, and Mirza are getting coverage because they represent a rare success in France, England, and India, respectively. 
And when the author of the article had mentioned "potential to do more in 2008" , why do we have to put up with your naive intrepretations? can you ground your opinions on facts and proper information rather than some baseless ,uninformed  assumptions? that's a very bad habit.

FYI, the prospects of Murray,tsonga are discussed widely by fans and Experts alike because they are serious talents.

Gasquet,baghdatis,berdych,tsonga,murray are regarded as top prospects of the future. any serious following of tennis would tell you that.

In comparison, Dani's potential is not as great as the others but she can be a very good player at the top.she is slightly out of place in this column. but drucker may think her potential is greater.
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