Iga Swiatek has cut a frustrated figure in recent months, but she was all smiles as she started the next chapter of her career under the watchful eye of new coach Francisco Roig and the great Rafael Nadal.<\/p>\n
The six-time Grand Slam winner has endured a difficult start to the 2026 season as she started the year at No 2, but has slipped to No 2 with Elena Rybakina and Coco Gauff overtaking her. Swiatek<\/a> has a win-loss record of 12-6 as she is yet to make it past the quarter-final of a WTA Tour event.<\/p>\n There have been several incidents of annoyance and exasperation on court from the Pole in recent months and it all came to head at the Miami Open when she was stunned in the second round by Magda Linette.<\/p>\n After the tournament, she announced her decision to split from coach Wim Fissette<\/a>, who joined her setup in October 2024, and earlier this week she announced that Roig<\/a>, who was part of Nadal\u2019s team for all 22 of his Grand Slam titles, as her new mentor.<\/p>\n Emma Raducanu\u2019s reluctance to embrace change may not be replicated by Iga Swiatek<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Why Francisco Roig has big shoes to fill as Iga Swiatek\u2019s new coach<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Swiatek\u2019s first training session with Roig took place at the Rafa Nadal Academy in Mallorca and tennis great Nadal was on hand to provide some tips.<\/p>\n The academy\u2019s official social media channels took an opportunity to post photos and videos of Swiatek, Roig and Nadal on the clay courts, stating: \u201cIt\u2019s not just training, it\u2019s a whole vibe.\u201d<\/p>\n It shows a different picture from the Swiatek that has been quite downcast in recent months, as if a weight has been lifted off her shoulders.<\/p>\n And the former world No 1 took took to Instagram to thank King of Clay Nadal for \u201cmaking her feel at home\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cTraining, learning and embracing each day here in Mallorca. Thank you @rafaelnadal for making me feel at home,\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n The Pole admitted during an interview with Sport.pl<\/a> ahead of the Roig announcement that she \u201cwasn\u2019t feeling good on court\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cI felt it was simply time for a change. Yes, it wasn\u2019t a decision made in Miami \u2014 it was a longer process during which I carefully considered everything,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cDuring the tournament in Doha, I realised I wasn\u2019t feeling as good on court as I had before.<\/p>\n \u201cOf course, different tournaments can have different reasons for a poor performance \u2013 sometimes I just know I wasn\u2019t focused that day, sometimes my forehand was failing, sometimes something else. It happens. But I felt like I wasn\u2019t playing as well, and that\u2019s why I started losing confidence.<\/p>\n \u201cAfter my loss to Maria Sakkari [in Doha], we sat down and had a long talk. We discussed what to change and how to approach the following week so I could get back to my solid game.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd indeed, we made some progress before Indian Wells. But when I considered the whole picture, I decided I needed a change.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n A post shared by Rafa Nadal Academy (@rafanadalacademy)<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n The post Iga Swiatek sends 18-word thank you message to Rafael Nadal as videos of training with legend emerge<\/a> appeared first on Tennis365<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Iga Swiatek has cut a frustrated figure in recent months, but she was all smiles as she started the next chapter of her career under the watchful eye of new coach Francisco Roig and the great Rafael Nadal. The six-time Grand Slam winner has endured a difficult start to the 2026 season as she started […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1977","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1977\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Iga Swiatek News<\/h2>\n
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