Bresnik on Thiem prognosis: “They laughed at me for that”

And not for sentimental reasons because of the very long collaboration until 2019.

Thiem has let it slide a bit in recent years, but now the 62-year-old from Lower Austria sees the ex-US Open winner back on the right track. Not least thanks to the change of coach to Benjamin Ebrahimzadeh. “That’s a good coach. Not a touring coach for me and that’s a huge difference. I assume that he’ll think about what needs to be done in the long term so that Dominic can play like he did from 2016 to 2020. During that time he was a week for Week among the top favorites. I’m sure that a high percentage was invested in training, “said Bresnik in Paris to the APA – Austria Press Agency.

It is important that the player continues to develop. “There are two types of coaches: those who develop and those who manage,” explains Bresnik. “It’s modest for me that someone only manages with what you put in their hands and doesn’t really create something productive.” Ebrahimzadeh does not belong to the latter category for Bresnik.

And Thiem is not as bad as many doomsayers make him out to be. “He’s still in the top 100 and he’s still at his level,” Bresnik knows, adding: “But you also have to be able to wake someone up from a deep sleep, the blows rest with him.”

Top 15 possible

The tennis coach, who is also respected worldwide, says about Thiem’s ​​current form: “I think that the serve is very good. I wouldn’t see much difference from before. Things are a bit more difficult when they are moving, there are problems it a little more.”

Bresnik definitely believes that Thiem can get back into the top 15 in the ATP ranking. “They laughed at me for that. Maybe first 15 is too high, but let him play well for two tournaments.” As has been the case for many years, he does not want to hear anything about mental causes. “Confidence always comes from achievement, but achievement doesn’t come from confidence – that’s a misconception!”

Thiem is also not a mentally weak player in principle: “One doesn’t win so many tournaments, doesn’t beat Federer, Djokovic, Nadal even on big stages if he’s mentally weak.” For Bresnik, Thiem is “a better tennis player than (Daniil) Medvedev, than (Casper) Ruud. Ruud even had a chance at number one, Dominic never.”

“Wanted to see him number one”

After he left, Thiem said again that he hadn’t done his job 100 percent well for a year and a half. “For me, he wasn’t on the tour for three years. He went from tournament to tournament, but you’ll get tired from working.”

More generally, Bresnik has sympathy for anyone who hits a bottom in their career. “If someone has personal problems or is going through difficult times, I don’t mind. You can think about other things than your sport for many reasons.” But what matters is how you deal with it. “It’s not always the fault of the person concerned, it’s always the environment.”

Bresnik is by no means indifferent to Thiem’s ​​career after the ugly end in spring 2019, including the legal dispute. After all, he had worked with Thiem for around a decade and a half and, among other things, led him to the first French Open final in 2018. What was his real goal with Thiem back then? “Actually, I wanted to see him as number one, for which a Grand Slam title is a prerequisite. Without a Grand Slam title, you won’t be number one. For me, Dominic was someone who, constructed on the drawing board, almost can’t get past it.”

For Bresnik, the coaching philosophy is clear. “The better I get, the harder the work, not the easier.” And even with age, the intensity does not decrease, he explains. “If I lift 10 kg one meter, I’ve worked. If I lift 10 kg ten times, I’ve worked more and if I do it in a minute, it’s more than an hour. That’s what the sport is about: it will Adapted to age, but the intensity is not reduced.”

With Julia Grabher and the Russian Alexander Schewtschenko, Bresnik, who has been a coach at the French Open more than 30 times, still has two hot irons in the fire.