Soderling splits with coach of five months

May 3, 2011 - 0:0

Robin Soderling has parted ways with his coach Claudio Pistolesi, just five months after joining forces with the Italian.

Soderling, who was coached by Magnus Norman until December last year, enjoyed a blistering start to the year by winning three of his first four tournaments in Brisbane, Rotterdam and Marseille.
His only ATP loss in the first two months of the season was at the hands of Ukrainian Alexandr Dolgopolov in the fourth round of the Australian Open.
But since then the Swedish world number five has been struggling and last week's straight sets loss to Juan Martin Del Potro in the quarter-finals at Estoril appears to have been the final straw.
""It's true, they will end their co-operation,"" Soderling's agent Nina Wennerstrom said. ""He's an amazingly good coach and Robin respects him a lot.
""There have been many things in their work that has been working very well but there have also been some parts that they have had different points of view.
""They have decided to end this together but they've done it as friends. Robin is proud of what he has achieved but knows that he can get even better. After all, he's just 26.
""We'll be looking at some options and we will make a decision quite soon. It's an intense time of the year with the French Open and lots of other tournaments. We'd like to find a replacement as soon as possible.""
Soderling has reached the final of the French Open in each of the past two years, losing to Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal respectively. The Swede also boasts the record of being the first, and so far only, man to beat Nadal at Roland Garros, which he did in 2009.
(Source: Eurosport)