You’ve watched your favourite players on the television but what are some of the roles that are vital in getting them there? Sidelines lifts the lid on details of the behind-the-scenes tennis world.

For top players walking down the tunnel, grabbing your racket and playing your game is a privilege every single tournament, but with this comes a colossal amount of work from not only the player, but a host of coaches and staff. 

The niche jobs of professionals behind the scenes can often make or break a tennis player’s match or even career. Here are three experts in tennis-related fields. 

Racket Stringing

Thierry Goor, 55, has been racket stringing for 25 years but never took it seriously until 7 years ago, living in Dubai, working as a regional director in airline industry solutions at Sabre, but tired of the corporate world and in need of a new challenge. Fast forward to now he owns and manages ‘Pro Stringers’ in Aldershot and Bromley, stringing at tournaments worldwide.

The first time I worked on a racket for Rafael Nadal I will be honest I had a little tear in my eye because he has been my hero for the last 20 years. 

Racket stringing, the process by which strings are adjusted based on a player’s style to ensure peak performance. The string type, tension and weight and frame of the racket are all factors which can influence, power control and spin of the ball. 

I have sat courtside and watched Nadal practice for matches but being so close and personal with him, helping his game and talking to him was incredible.

Being a tennis fan from so young, picking up my first racket aged 11, I always craved to be close to the sport and being in corporate industry distanced me from that. When I found out Dubai lacked elite stringers, I attended an ERSA (European Racket Stringing Association) international workshop and quickly progressed up the certification levels. 

I started using all my holiday time off to work at tennis tournaments, fulfilling my passion for the sport. 

After stringing at the Dubai Duty-Free for four years, The WTA 1000 and The Men’s ATP 500 I started to make a name for myself, and I was preparing rackets for Djokovic, Nadal and Sinner to name a few. 

In 2021 Djokovic ended Nadal’s 4-year reign of winning The French Open. The match will be remembered for years as a historic game between two titans of tennis on Roland Garros clay. 

I remember seeing Nadal when I was working one day.

I said: “Rafa can you do me a favour.”

Nadal looked back surprised; he replied: “Yes of course for you I do any favour.”

“Please win the French open this year again.”

Whilst Nadal’s team around him were sort of laughing, he said “For you of course I will win the French open.”

In 2022, Nadal won the French Open once again.

When I arrived in the UK during Covid and following Brexit, the ERSA put me forward to string at Wimbledon straight away. I trusted my ability and certifications enough to realise, I’m great at what I do so that wasn’t a concern to me.

At Wimbledon and the bigger tournaments there are 20 stringers in the back office stringing up to 40 rackets a day. It’s really hard work; in 2024 I was invited to the Australian Open to string and there were 600-700 rackets coming through the door on day one. I ended up stringing 490 rackets over 23 days.

I have seen colleagues burst into tears and say I can’t do it anymore because sometimes we will be leaving the stringing room at 1:30am and getting back in there at 6am to get through the workload.

Physiotherapy

Milena (Milly) Mirkovic, 41, has been a tennis physiotherapist for over 15 years, working for the LTA (Lawn Tennis Association) for 14 of those. She is now Founder of Tennis Physio and Head Physiotherapist at the Billie Jean King Cup for Team GB, looking after elite British players such as Emma Raducanu and Katie Boulter.

At tournaments we physios are usually the ones to get through the doors first in the morning and last to finish with a player.

Check-ins in the morning, recoveries at the end of the day and we are present during the day on standby for any additional monitoring, helping on court or even just picking up balls. 

We end up working long hours.

But the atmosphere working at prestigious tournaments (The Billie Jean King Cup) is buzzing and to be the Head Physiotherapist, working alongside great players and helping them to achieve their goals is an absolute honour and makes it all worth it.

I grew up loving and playing tennis, I picked up my first racket at 11 and became a good junior player in Australia, but chronic back injuries pushed me to look elsewhere for a career, and that heartbreak led me to fall in love with physiotherapy and study it at The University of Australia. 

My sister ended up becoming a tennis professional (Marija Mirkovic) and working alongside her, having retired from the sport so early myself, really helps me to relate to the journey of the elite players I have coached.

This journey certainly isn’t smooth sailing, and fans often see the positive side rather than the tough grind and injuries that can play a serious negative part on both the physical and the mental side.

The injuries I see vary so much – every player is different – it keeps me on my toes. The surface and temperature have a big effect. 

Injuries are inevitable, but it is how you deal with it. 

This sport has a very short off-season, so we have to focus on their scheduling and training blocks with their entourage to help them tolerate the ever-increasing demands of the game and improve their physical gains and make them more robust. 

We regularly screen and monitor them and offer treatment which varies from soft tissue work to manual therapy. 

As time has gone on, the game has developed, and the role of behind-the-scenes coaches and staff helps immensely. The higher ranked players are now investing much more into performance analysis etc. to get those marginal gains which significantly helps to reduce injury risk. 

It isn’t just about the on-court training, it is about the physical preparation behind the scenes to help your body to become robust and handle the demands of the game – rehabilitation is key as the journey is long. 

Performance Analysis 

Dr Tom Seabury, 30, is a racket sport performance analyst and self-proclaimed ‘racket sport consultant’. He is a chartered member of the British Psychological Society and an experienced sporting coach with nearly a decade and a half of experience. He is the founder and manager of Seabury Performance. 

I grew up with a love for racket sports and started playing when I was four, but when I was around 15, I got really injury prone because I was very tall from a young age – this forced me to move into coaching and I was entranced by psychology, prompting my PhD in psychology on elite sporting performance at Swansea University.

When I was younger you had a ‘jack-of-all trades coach’, who taught all the basics but as time has progressed, you now have SSC coaches, nutritionists and my role. 

Due to what players wanted I found a way to combine traditional psychology with racket sport coaching, being on court rather than in an office. On court I create game designs which emulate pressure to really stress-test their performance and problem solving, taking their skill acquisition from what they do with their coaches and make it more robust.

A great example of this is…

The elite players know all the theory and tactics, have the passion and desire to win but it is a case of pairing it all together. Players like Nadal often use a towel in between each point for 10 seconds then they walk back onto the court. 

They obviously aren’t doing it for the sake of it, what is interesting is the interaction I have with my players about this.

I say: “What are your strategies to stay calm in between points?”

They say: “I take my towel on court with me, because a YouTube video told me to.”

“Okay great what for?”

“I go to it in between every point for 10 seconds because elite players do it”.

That’s great because its vital players take some down time between points, as players have around 25 seconds compared to the average point length, which is 15 seconds, but it’s knowing why they do it which is important.  

This helps them to understand the whole process where the towel is a mental cue and the trigger to start a conversation in their head or a breathing process, which will take you to the next level. 

Enjoy the process of training and playing the sport you love but also embrace the chaotic side of the game, then whether you win or lose you have a good time trying to solve that problem and you walk away happy and improved.