La Gazzetta Dello Sport\u2019s Federica Cocchi<\/a>. \u201cIt would be easier for amateurs and more difficult for professionals, and the game would be less violent. The beauty of tennis is being able to see the gesture.<\/p>\n\u201cWhen McEnroe or Nastase played, everything was there: gesture, hand, tactics. Tennis is the only sport that begins with a \u2018penalty kick\u2019: if you serve well, the opponent doesn\u2019t play\u2026 In other disciplines they have changed the rules to increase the spectacle.\u201d<\/p>\n
Toni Nadal says the punishing calendar is not the primary problem tennis faces. Rather, he views the ferocious pace of play emanating from rocket-launcher racquets and polyester strings, for turning tennis into a sport of \u201cviolence\u201d where players are more vulnerable to injury.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not a question of calendar. Now many will disagree, but the real problem is that the ball always goes too fast,\u201d Toni Nadal said. \u201cIt is not a question of quantity, but of intensity and violence of the gesture.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are almost no \u201ctactical\u201d players like [Guillermo] Coria or [Gaston] Gaudio anymore, who tried to build. Today it is often just a race to see who hits hardest. And when you make such quick gestures, when you get to a ball at full speed, brake and start again, it\u2019s easy for the body to go to the limit and get hurt. I think we should try to slow down the game a bit.\u201d<\/p>\n
Toni Nadal isn\u2019t the first prominent tennis player or coach to suggest downsizing racquets. Hall of Famer John McEnroe told Tennis Now years back, he would limit racquet size and proposed playing a tournament featuring only wood racquets to see how today\u2019s elite players would fare.<\/p>\n
\u201cImagine if you gave major league baseball players aluminum bats like they use in college,\u201d McEnroe told Tennis Now. \u201cSomeone could get killed by a line drive if major league baseball players used aluminum bats. The racquets in today\u2019s tennis are too powerful and it impacts the game.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked if he subscribes to the popular theory that Sinner\u2019s game is Djokovic 2.0, Toni Nadal disagreed saying he believes the Grand Slam king is more complete than the reigning Wimbledon winner.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think Djokovic is a bit more complete. Sinner has more speed in his shots, Nole a little more touch,\u201d Toni Nadal said. \u201cThey have in common the fact that they always impose a high pace and have exceptional ball control, with very high level movements. Jannik plays with a very defined scheme: he imposes a very fast pace from the beginning, difficult for anyone to hold.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Richard Pagliaro | Tuesday, November 11, 2025Photo credit: Rafa Nadal Academy Tennis has been called boxing without…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":272685,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[99,428],"class_list":{"0":"post-286318","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-sports","9":"tag-tennis"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=286318"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286318\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/272685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=286318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=286318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=286318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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