Episodes

You won´t find many people with more experience in tennis and passion for the sport than Ireland´s Dave Miley. Dave is a former pro tennis player, coach and author who worked at the ITF for 25 years. During that time he helped bring in the mini tennis ball rule change for 10U competition adopted by the ITF and was responsible for the introduction of the combined ranking in Junior Tennis in 2005. Dave is the current Tennis Director of the Kazakhstan Federation and ch...

The 2023 Australian Open saw Aryna Sabalenka winning her first Grand Slam, and Novak Djokovic equalling Rafael Nadal´s record of 22 Grand Slam titles. But it will be hard to look back on this year´s event without thinking of Sir Andy Murray´s incredible run in Week 1. Our panel of experts are back to chat to CTC Host Dan Kiernan about all the action in Melbourne... Top tennis commentator and former pro Robbie Koenig gives us an inside look from his two weeks at Melbourne Park. ...

WTA player Tamara Zidansek jumped onto our screens during the 2021 French Open, when as an unseeded player she made it through to the semi-finals at Roland Garros. Since then, the Slovenian has reached a career high of 22 WTA and this week lost in a 3 set battle to World Number 2 Ons Jabeur at the Australian Open. CTC host Dan Kiernan caught up with Tamara just before she started pre-season training last month to chat about her tennis career so far including.. How she thinks she ...

We´re just a few hours away now from the first Grand Slam of the year! We´ve been studying the draws and have brought our panel back together for today´s episode to preview the 2023 Australian Open. Joining Control the Controllables host Dan Kiernan to discuss the "popcorn-ready" match-ups, the dark horses to look out for and their picks for the titles are:- Denmark´s Davis Cup Captain and 2012 Wimbledon Mens Doubles Champion Freddie Nielsen. Kieron Vorster is Liam Broady´s S&C Coac...

12 months ago, GB´s Henry Patten and Julian Cash were two of many pro players travelling the world on a shoe-string budget, dreaming of competing at the big events. With rankings outside of the worlds top 600, Grand Slams seemed a long way away. Fast forward to December 2022, and Patten & Cash had the most successful year on the ATP Challenger Tour.. ever! And they only played their first event together in June. With a winning streak that saw the pair win 14 trophies including 10 ATP Ch...

If you watch a lot of tennis, then you´ll be familiar with the voice of today´s guest. You may have even caught one of his legendary one-liners! Robbie Koenig is a former tennis player from South Africa who is now one of the leading commentators in the sport. Robbie won 5 doubles titles during his pro career, before turning his hand to coaching, then broadcasting. It´s not often we get to hear the views of someone with such experience in so many roles within the sport. Robbie come...

It´s been quite the year for Lloyd Glasspool and Harri Heliövaara. The GB/Finnish pair began 2022 playing the Challenger circuit, and ended it at the ATP Finals in Turin as the 5th best men´s doubles team in the world. Since January, they´ve won an ATP Title in Hamburg, reached another 6 ATP Finals, and 2 Grand Slam Quarter-finals. It´s seen Lloyd and Harri hit career high rankings of 12 and 11 in the world respectively. We speak to them fresh off the back of their run to the semi...

In today´s episode we´re talking tennis and football with journalist Henry Winter. Henry is currently the Chief Football Writer for the Times. He´s written several books during his career and makes regular appearances as a pundit on TV and radio. Henry chats to us about equality in sport, and the coverage of women´s sports in the media. He gives us his thoughts on the impact of social media on journalism over the past 15 years and why he thinks sport teaches us about life. There´s...

In today´s episode we speak to the tennis queen of tik tok, Daria Saville! Daria is currently recovering from surgery after tearing her ACL during a match against Naomi Osaka at the Pan Pacific Open last month. A former world junior number 1, Daria won the US Open Girls title in 2010, before reaching a career high of 20 in the WTA rankings in 2017. This is her third major injury in the last few years, and in today´s episode Daria opens up about how she stays positive during months of re...

Eric Butorac is the Director Professional of of tennis operations and player relations at the USTA. A former American top 20 doubles player, Eric won 18 ATP doubles titles during his career and reached the final of the Australian Open in 2014. He was half of the famous Stretch and Booty doubles partnership with Jamie Murray. Since retiring from pro tennis, Butorac has also served as assistant tournament director of the combined ATP and WTA 1000-level US Open Series event. In today...

In today´s episode we speak to GB´s Ryan Peniston. Ryan has had his breakthrough year on the ATP Tour reaching a career high of 123, with wins over top 50 players Casper Rudd, Holger Rune and Francisco Cerundolo. He had an amazing run during the grass court season reaching the quarter-finals at Nottingham, Queen's and Eastbourne, and the 2nd round of Wimbledon on his debut at SW19. Ryan was diagnosed with cancer at the age of 1, spending months in hospital undergoing surgery and chemoth...

Roger Federer will play the final match of his incredible career today at the Laver Cup in London. The 20 time Grand Slam Champion and former World number 1 will team up with his greatest rival Rafael Nadal in the doubles, as Europe take on the rest of the word at the 02 arena. To mark his final farewell to tennis, we´ve brought together these brilliant guests to share their tributes and stories and let us know what Roger is really like behind the scenes... 🎾 Former Belgian Pro Pl...

What an amazing two weeks at Flushing Meadows for the 2022 US Open! We have two new US Open Champions, a new world number 1, and we said good bye to the GOAT of the women´s game, Serena Williams. So much to discuss with our panelists, from the old to the new and story lines aplenty in between. Returning to our panel is US pro player and New York native Noah Rubin and Denmark´s Davis Cup Captain Freddie Nielsen, a Control the Controllables regular. We look into many topics includin...

What an exciting US Open it´s been! As it draws to an end, we´ve taken the chance to speak to former England cricketer Monty Panesar about the trials and tribulations of professional sport. As you´ll hear, there´s many similarities between professional cricket and tennis. Monty tells us about his own mental health battles during his career, and the importance of sport specific fitness training. He shares stories from Ashes winning moments and what it felt like bowling out some of the gr...

As the final Grand Slam of 2022 gets started, we bring together our amazing panelists to discuss all things US Open. We are joined for the first time on our Grand Slam panel by native New Yorker and ATP Player Noah Rubin who is alongside Mark Hilton, current coach to Sir Andy Murray and ever present former Wimbledon Men´s Doubles Champion and current Danish Davis Cup Captain, Freddie Nielsen. The panelists share personal stories, insights into life at the US Open and their predictions f...

Ken Skupski is one of GB´s most successful doubles players. After a career spanning 3 decades, he recently retired from pro tennis playing his last match in the Mens Doubles at Wimbledon. In today´s episode, Ken talks through his career in numbers and in words. From his success in Juniors, to his US College days at Louisiana State University, through to his 18 years on the pro tour, he shares his honest learnings, his memories and the challenges of the past 20+ years including:- ...

In today´s episode we speak to ATP Coach and former pro player Neville Godwin. Neville reached a career high of 90 in the world in singles and 57 in doubles during his career, and won the US Open Boys Doubles as a junior in 1993. After retiring he became a coach, helping fellow South African Kevin Anderson to a world top 10 ranking and the US Open final in 2017. Neville won ATP Coach of the Year that same year. After he split with Anderson, he worked with Hyeon Chung who became th...

Wimbledon 2022 was another fantastic event, full of stories and stand out performances. After all the pre-event hype around the ban of Russian and Belarusian players and no ATP/WTA points, the tennis did the talking at SW19. In today´s episode we are joined by some of the players behind those stories, as well as two of our regular Grand Slam panelists:- Mixed Doubles Champions Desirae Krawczyk from the USA and GB´s Neal Skupski tell us about winning their 2nd Wimbledon title in a row t...

Ross Hutchins is a former top 30 doubles player and the Chief Player Officer at the ATP. He comes from a strong British tennis stock, as the son of Paul Hutchins, former GB Davis Cup captain and British tennis great. Ross won 5 ATP doubles titles during his pro career, reaching 13 ATP Tour doubles finals, and representing Great Britain several times in the Davis Cup. He was ranked 28 in the world in doubles in 2012 when he made the shock announcement that he´d been diagnosed with ...

It´s our favourite time of the year, and Wimbledon 2022 has kicked off with a bang! 9 Brits are already through to Round 2, the most since 1997. This year there are more than 60 former and current US College players in the main draw at SW19! In today´s episode we are getting to know 5 GB players who are making their Wimbledon debuts after successful US/UK university careers. Joining CTC Host Dan Kiernan on this years Wimbledon Preview Panel are:- Julian Cash reached number 1 doub...

Jack Draper is one of Great Britain´s hottest up and coming prospects. At 20-years-old he broke into the world´s top 100 ATP rankings last week. It came on the same day that he picked up his first win over a top 20 player, beating Taylor Fritz in the first round at Queens. Jack sat down with CTC Host Dan Kiernan for the first time, as he prepared for the ATP grass court event in Eastbourne. Listen to him talk about his career so far, including reaching the final of Junior Wimbledon at a...

The 2022 French Open was an historic event. Rafael Nadal won his 14th Roland Garros and 22nd Grand Slam, as he beat Casper Ruud in the final. Iga Swiatek moved to 35 match wins in a row, and her 2nd French Open title in 3 years as she swept past 18-year-old Coco Gauff in the womens final. More records were broken as Jean Julien Rojer became the oldest male play to win a Grand Slam in the Open era, as he partnered the first ever player from Central America to win a Grand Slam, Marcelo Ar...

We first spoke to Cameron Norrie on the Control the Controllables podcast back in August 2020. He was at the US Open and sat at 76 in the ATP rankings. Since then, Cameron has won 4 ATP titles including the Masters 1000 in Indian Wells and broke into the top 10 in the world in April. Today he joins us with his coach Facu Lugones to catch up on Cameron´s amazing run of form since he was last on the show, and what he´s done differently to be able to move up the rankings. Read full s...

The second Grand Slam of the season is underway! Can Iga Swiatek build on her 30-match winning streak to win the French Open for a second time? Will it be Djokovic, Nadal or man of the moment Carlos Alcaraz making it through the top half of the mens draw? Or, will we have a surprise finalist? Joining CTC host Dan Kiernan to give their expert opinions on all these questions and more are:- Denmark´s Davis Cup Captain and 2012 Wimbledon Doubles Champion, Freddie Nielsen Kieron Vorster, wh...