Andrey Rublev’s journey in his coach’s words: “Not a single day when he’s not 100%”

You’ve been Andrey’s coach since 2016. How did you first meet and how did you decide to become his full-time coach?

I met Andrey for the first time in 2016, after Miami. He was a young player. Galo Blanco and I, we have an academy in Barcelona. So after five years, I decided to stop [working] with Marcel Granollers, because I was really tired. I was having problems at home with my family and I felt like I needed to stay at home a bit. So I stopped for six months. Galo came one day – he was at that moment travelling and working with [Karen] Khachanov – and Khachanov and Andrey, they are really close. So one day, Rublev was just moving from America, trying to find a coach. And he, at that moment, was a bit lost. So they talked with Galo. 

This was when he was still a junior?

He already finished juniors, playing Challengers. So Galo called me from America. He told me, ‘Look, there is one guy, Russian, that looks very good. He’s [going to be] No 1 or No 2 in the world. He finished No 1 in juniors. And I think you can be the perfect coach for him. And he’s looking for one. What do you think?’ In the beginning, I was like, ‘Russian and Spanish, I don’t know, to travel all the year talking in English…’ and I said, ‘I don’t think it’s gonna work.’ And he was telling me, ‘No, look, the guy is a super-hard worker, you would like him.’ So we made a proposal and we said, OK, he’s gonna come for three weeks with Karen to practise. ‘You practise with him, and then we’ll see what happens and you meet him and you can talk and we can see.’ At that time I was in my academy, running the academy, like a normal day with other kids. This is our academy. So we were running it. The investors in this academy were Galo, me and another partner.

Did you hear about Andrey before seeing him?

No, I knew him only because Galo was telling me. And then I started to watch a few Challengers on the computer, just paying attention to who I’m going to be faced with. So (Rublev) landed after Miami to Barcelona. And we started to practise on clay. It was like, two, three weeks and then straight away, there was the Marrakech tournament, and I say, ‘OK, it’s one hour, two hours from Barcelona, let’s go and let’s see what happens.’ And then somehow I started to realise that he’s a special guy, a kid that deserves (it). He wanted to become a player, it’s not a problem for him to stay on court many hours. I love to stay on court a lot, also. So I started to be motivated after two, three weeks. And then I say, ‘OK, let’s try till the end of the year, and let’s see how it goes.’ And we started to work like that.

You said that you saw he was a special player. How did you see that?

When you see a player, the first thing you feel is that he has so many ways to improve. You need to develop a lot of things. When you’re having a player with potential you think that you can improve him because I was already working with Granollers, and with other players in the academy. I also believed that I can develop this player. So, I started to work with Andrey. It was Galo and me all together with Khachanov. We were in that moment more like family, travelling from tournament to tournament. And Karen was pushing Andrey, Andrey was pushing Karen. We started to really enjoy it and to work every day full, non-stop. And you can feel also the way he looked at the ball. A guy who can be on court, (saying), ‘Just one more, one more’ – you don’t have so many. He made me stay pumped all the time. I think when you need to force a player to stay on court, then you have a problem. With Andrey it is so easy, he’s always ready, not one day off. You need to force him to stop because sometimes he is: ‘I want to improve, I want to improve.’

As soon as he started to work you can feel month by month he was a bit better

Fernando Vicente

If you go back in time, what was your first impression when seeing him play? If you had to describe his character to a filmmaker, who was Andrey when he was 19/20? For instance, in terms of objectives, goals?

At the beginning, for everybody, the dream is to become top 100, the goal is to become top 50, step by step. But when you talk with Andrey and when you finish No 1 in the world, since you are young, and you have on your mind, numbers like No 1 in the world as a junior, I made the semi-final here, I won junior Roland-Garros…the goal for these guys is to try to achieve or to win the best events possible. As a coach, you can feel that actually this goal is too far away and it’s not gonna be easy, it’s gonna take time and they maybe make you have these crazy things that you say, ‘F***, is not gonna be possible.’

But the way he’s thinking, at the end, you really believe. But at that moment, when I’m starting to work, I know we need two years to be at a good level because he landed in Barcelona with so many weak parts of his game, so many mobility issues, his body was not ready, the forehand was huge, but you could feel it was not complete. Now he hits much better with the backhand, he can hit with everybody; in that moment it was not possible.

The mobility was not professional, I will say, and he did not even understand why you play the shots in certain directions. All these things were completely wrong, taking bad decisions. It was so easy to work with him because in my opinion, he was always aggressive like with this forehand and he was winning by this shot. But he wasn’t ready to win a lot of matches on the ATP Tour.

And then as soon as he started to work you can feel month by month he was a bit better, a bit better, a bit better. He understood more. I mean, it took time, but we improved a lot. Now he’s a different player. I will say he still has many things to improve. But these two, three years I enjoyed a lot. I had all this energy to spend this time on court and for me, my priority in that moment started to be Andrey and I started to follow his crazy thoughts, his (desire) to achieve big goals.

You said when he was a junior he only thought about hitting harder and nothing more?

Harder, harder, harder, without thinking. They were not doing it properly. He was telling me that it was not working and he didn’t understand why he was doing things and in which sense we are doing that. At the beginning it was only hitting more, hitting more, hitting more, and they were not doing the right drills, to talk about tactics. It was more about playing with freedom, you know, shoot the ball. On one level, it’s more than enough, because he had the potential and with the forehand he was hurting a lot of players. But then you need to improve. If not, at the end when you face better players, you cannot. 

At this moment, if I had told you this guy will be a regular member of the top 10 in a few years, would you have believed it?

At the beginning I was not convinced of that, because his body was not ready. The speed that you want, when you want to hit hard and you want to pass your opponents, you need to get the position. So if you don’t get the position and you are in a bad position, your power is not the same. So we improved a lot in fitness whilst mobility still needed to improve. If you compare (Carlos) Alcaraz or other players, the way they move, or I don’t know, let’s say there are many players that are moving super-fast. He improved a lot. And then we put balance on his game. He improved his serve. Year by year he’s doing things better. But to win the Grand Slams, you need to be more, I don’t know, stronger in all the ways.

There were so many things to do. How did you work? What was the first step, the second step?

Well, the first thing was like, ‘Okay, you have this forehand, so you need to understand that you need to try to get as much as you can with the best shot that you have.’ So at the beginning we were trying to do basket repetitions to try to go around the balls, (for example), in the middle, you have to always take the forehand. And then a lot of baskets, hours and hours improving the backhand because he was not feeling the ball, he was playing a lot of slices. I think at the end of the first year that we started to work, he was only playing a slice and Andrey didn’t really have a good slice, but he couldn’t play with two hands.

So we started to work on the backhand. You make a base, you start from the baseline and try to go to the net. So we did a bit less power. I mean, at the beginning, it was less power and more control, exercises with mobility, always trying to understand the effects changes can have. So all these exercises that everybody should do if you want to make this step, sometimes, because they love to get full power, and like you say in Spain – and that’s why I think we are good – we are consistent always from the baseline from both sides without missing. And then of course I didn’t want Andrey to play high balls. Everybody thinks that it is funny (in Spain) they play high only and they don’t hit the ball flat. It is not true. So we make a base from the baseline on everything going forward.

He won a few matches that I didn’t expect and then I said, “f***, this guy is really good, man”

Fernando Vicente

When did you understand that he was a good learner and that he could improve well?

From the beginning. We started to work and at the beginning he was not winning that much. But I think in the middle of the summer he clicked a bit, like he started to win a few Challengers. I think he won Umag already in 2017. Then he started to beat good players, the process was not that long. I was expecting that he would take more time, because he made the quarter-finals in US Open in 2017. I was really impressed because he won a few matches that I didn’t expect and then I said, ‘Fuck, this guy is really good, man’, without having this body, and these weak parts in terms of mobility, in terms of mindset, he made the quarters, this is good.

But, personally, I was thinking we were really far away because he was facing Rafa (Nadal) and it was no match, he couldn’t move, so he was still far away from that level. So in my mind I was thinking, ‘OK, this quarter-final is not real.’ He was not “lucky”, you cannot say lucky, but the draw was more or less good, and still he beat (David) Goffin and (Grigor) Dimitrov, they were good wins for him. But I was feeling in my own mind that he is not ready to play at this level.

To become a champion you need the mindset of a champion, is that something you have to work on?

We’re still working on that, it’s never over for any player. Never over. You need to be ready. If you don’t have balance it doesn’t matter. At this level, every single detail, it happens to be a lot, when you lose focus. See what happened at the ATP Finals. He played really well at the beginning, or you could feel the matches like that. And as soon as you drop the level you are out. So this has happened to him in some parts of the season. You can see Novak (Djokovic), Daniil (Medvedev), Rafa, they win or they lose, but they have this balance, you know, sometimes they go crazy, but they still have the same level. Andrey’s level, as soon as he starts to go crazy with these things, the level drops. And he needs to understand (that). So we are working to make him understand that that cannot happen if you want to achieve these things. I’m not talking about shots, his forehand is one of the best, his backhand, I don’t know how to make a ranking about these things (but) his serve is good. We need to keep improving second serve, we need to go forward much more to close the points. All these things. But to be honest, now, there isn’t much time to make our break, when we had to stop working on these things, in pandemic time, Andrey and me, we had three months of full practice.

What does full practice mean in terms of hours?

We had Covid in March (2020), we went to Barcelona from Indian Wells. I was not allowed to go. And we were going for three months. I went to my club to do all this work. I was allowed to go because we have a property that you have to take care of. He was coming with a car full of water so if the police caught him, he had to say that he was coming from the supermarket so we were meeting every day.

You played with the law at this moment?

Yes. The beginning, we started for at least two weeks, but then we decided to stop because the calendar (was not being played) and he got a bit depressed. And then the ATP started to talk about ‘maybe tennis is gonna start’ and then we started again. Then it was a good time to improve a lot of things.

We are doing things with the mental coach but we have up and down

Fernando Vicente

And what would you say you improve decisively at this moment?

Specific things, like mobility, we made a huge work, I will say, and I really enjoyed a lot. That’s why I say that to improve things now with this calendar is not easy. Mentally, yes. Because you’re competing, all these things that happens to you, OK, you can you can improve during the matches. So, this is the thing.

Would you say the pandemic was very beneficial for him to go to the next level?

We improved a lot. We worked a lot.  

And he had results after that. He never dropped really in terms of results after this period. Not that much.

Now he is more consistent, yes. But we want to jump to the next level. 

Mindset is several things. It's the focus you talked about, the focus is the inner belief or so that you can do things. How would you describe Andrey’s mindset on his way to the top level? What is good, what has to be worked on?

He needs to (keep working). He’s really humble outside. He is a really nice guy.

Isn't he too humble?

Sometimes. I’m a bit pissed with him when sometimes… He’s always saying yes to everybody. He needs to be more selfish sometimes, I think. He’s spending a lot of hours with the fans. He just can’t say no. When he says no, it’s because at the end, he is super-tired. But he’s always ready to do things for other people. You know, doesn’t matter people who call him, (he will say), “No, we’ll see, let me try”. Always. “I have a friend”… Always trying to to help.

But as a champion, when it comes to highest level… Is he too humble?

Andrey, he respects all the players. But…I don’t know how to say it. Sometimes he’s losing his mind. And he needs to understand that at this level, you can lose. You just can lose with these top guys. Sometimes, these extremely crazy things that he’s doing, it’s like when a kid used to take the toy. When he starts to lose, he wants to recover the toy. And then he starts to cry and cry. He needs to be humble and to understand that you have some somebody in front, like with Daniil, whom he played 10 times, he lost eight and he won two times.

And this is the problem. He loses the first set and the (idea) is to try to to keep the same level till the end. We are doing things with the mental coach but we have up and down. You cannot change one day from another day. We had a conversation before playing Daniil, and I think it happened again. So what we’ll try is always about balance. He needs to understand that you can lose, you can win, it is not only (about) to win, to win, to win.

But I will say because of this mentality, sometimes he’s winning a lot, because the mentality is really positive, because he really believes. But like I say, at the top level, you cannot behave, your body language should be different, you cannot be only thinking (about) you, the guy is playing good, how to face these problems. He wants to find the solution, completely out of control, without trying to relax a bit. He’s doing meditation a bit, he’s doing things, but he is still a bit not understanding this process.

When you are on court, you lost the first set, OK, it’s like football, you stop a bit and you think what to do on the second part of the match. Second set, “What can I do (to) improve (and be) better?” So not to go crazy, complain, wasting time without paying attention on the problem.

We felt it was better this year, wasn't it?

It was better but there are still things that are not easy. These guys are coming from Russia, it’s a different mentality. (They think), if you are number four, now you have to be better… That (it) doesn’t matter what they they will achieve, it’s never going to be enough. And sometimes it’s good, because all the top players are a bit like that. But you need to understand, emotionally, that everybody plays good mentally. Andrey sometimes, he doesn’t really enjoy. For him, tennis is everything.

Do you tell him “enjoy more” maybe ?

We talk for hours and hours. Sometimes we don’t sleep. At the beginning, we were sharing a room, staying downstairs or sitting on the streets, talking about how it was possible… to be disappointed in himself. And of course we talk. It’s easy to talk with him. You don’t have a problem. He needs to be a bit more mature in this sense.

Now he is completely 24 hours about tennis

Fernando Vicente

He lost confidence when he was injured a few seasons ago, like he told us at UTS Frankfurt. It happened already to him not to be able to play during a long moment. So he has a room to feel lucky to be in shape.

He had one injury on the back. He knows. Now he is completely 24 hours about tennis. With Andrey it is almost impossible to make him stop. After the ATP Finals, normally everybody will stop for two three weeks, they’re gonna do maybe holidays. Andrey, he’s gonna have one week off and we are going to meet in Dubai for the pre-season in Dubai. First with a fitness coach; (If) you come in from another tournament, you land on Friday, and I will say, ‘Saturday and Sunday we don’t practise,’ he would say, ‘What do you mean, we don’t practise?’ He wants to to be on court. 

Do you feel that he could burn out at some stage?

It’s too much the way the calendar we have to follow. And there is also some events that you love to play like a Laver Cup. So he flew from Laver Cup to China. He played two events in China. And then because of the Masters, you have to follow the calendar week by week till you qualify. All the players are doing the same. You can see everybody is the same.

You don't think he's playing more than others ?

I don’t really check. Of course if you compare with Novak and these guys. Maybe this year, in 2024, we should (skip) some tournaments. But sometimes you make a deal with one tournament. After Monte-Carlo, he won Monte Carlo. I said: ‘Better to not play.’ He said: ‘No, they’re going to start on Wednesday and they make an effort, they trust in me, that’s why they signed me to go.’ And he went to Banja Luca and he made finals. He’s not a guy who will tank. Sometimes he plays doubles. He wants to go full.

Andrey plays huge. He’s been top 10 for ages now. But when you talk about him with him, probably he devalues himself. You can tell him : "Andrey, you're very popular, people love you". He can say : "No, no, no, it's not true. Not that much."

Yes. Andrey can be like this. But I like that he’s like this. I prefer one guy who is humble. The thing is, when you go on court, what do you do? Doesn’t matter if you’re humble, these guys that maybe they like to make photo shoots or other things or other stuff? In my opinion, to be humble, it’s good, but you need to show more that I’m here, you know.

Don't you feel he puts a limit on himself? That was my point.

Yes and no. I just think he is not mature enough. And he doesn’t really understand yet these last things are missing. But I think in his own mind, he is ready to beat everyone. 

And do you think that in that aspect, he might be a late bloomer. I mean, he's very consistent at the top. But maybe he needs to be 32, to understand everything that will get him to the highest points ?

I don’t know, I think the moment should be now. He’s already four years here on the Masters (ATP Finals). He’s already playing with the best players. If you have one chance, you need to be ready. You never know when it’s going to happen again. Nobody knows. But you need to be ready and to not fail, or to try not to do the same mistakes year by year.

What does he need to win a Grand Slam? If you could take three things in which you will improve and that he needs, what would they be?

I will say two things. Like I said before, the mindset. It should be like: “I am ready, I will work and be ready to do that.” Avoid the stress that is like “I want to win”. Because for everybody they want to reach quarter-finals, semi-finals. But if you don’t really understand that you need to save energy – stress means that you are thinking about the future, right? That you want to know what’s going to happen. To control these things and the things are going to happen because I’m working properly, and it’s gonna happen and we’ll see. You have to believe and then to be humble and to understand that everybody’s doing the same work.

So more focus on the process than the outcome?

Everybody’s saying the same things. Yes, the process is the key. You’re gonna start with one Grand Slam, maybe losing the first set and you panic and then you start to think “(What) if I lose ?” “If I lose”, this is what I hate a bit at this level, like a coach. At the beginning I was really enjoying a lot and I think it happens to everybody. I feel the same also with Alcaraz now at the end of the year. When you’re coming here, it looks like you have to win, if you don’t win you are not good enough.

All these inputs are coming from outside. Maybe you are not good enough, maybe you know that you don’t have enough skills to beat these guys. But you need to relax to see everything, and then try to somehow deal with the problems that you face, depending on the players and that’s all. You cannot do so much and then keep working.

In Frankfurt, he told us that in his mind, he needs more speed in a different situation.

Mobility is really important. Tennis is about position. When you are in a good position, you can hit in different ways. When the ball is coming fast to you and you don’t have position you try to make it, if you have good position, you can shoot hard everywhere. So all these players who in my opinion, are the good players, are better defenders – all styles, they bring balls in bad position, doesn’t matter. Andy Murray, Rafa, Alcaraz – all (different) styles – you need to beat them (with) three, four winners.

Daniil, you need to break the wall side to side, or come into the net or make drop shots or you need different things. If you don’t have this at the end, you need to be really stable to play hard and stable during two hours. If not, somehow you’re going to lose or you’re gonna get tired or you need to be like you say, to make more like them with Daniil like, what to do. OK, let’s pass 20 balls, and then somehow you need to attack. you need this energy during two hours, not only one set.

Do you use the stats you have today? For example you can know how often you are in attacking position, how often your natural position is, how often in defensive position and how much you convert in.

Not really. The numbers, everybody knows everybody. You cannot be like a machine. It helps. But all the players, they know. If I show you the paper, OK, the guy is gonna serve 80% to your backhand, I know. But when the moment comes, you can go into the numbers and you can say OK, in break points these guys serve wide and you know that the guy, he knows.

You cannot be a machine, I mean, if you play with (Ivo) Karlovic, or the guys who you cannot even return the ball, you know they like to go on break points there. The guy knows that you know. So you play these streaky shots, sometimes it happens, sometimes it’s not happening. So at the end, the player needs to take the decision. If you make him like a machine like they cannot (think) with it sometimes. But it’s not really working.

I get stressed when I see the way he’s behaving

Fernando Vicente

Andrey said to Russian television two or three years ago that he had nothing in his life except tennis, that it was all his life. I mean, is it true in your opinion? I think it can't be 100 percent true, in Frankfurt he talked about music for instance.

He’s doing things but if you check the calendar I can promise that for him, there is no time to do [anything else]. If we land here on on Tuesday, we have activity, practice and then activity with ATP there and then interview and then even if you want, you cannot do many things. OK, maybe he likes to go, I don’t know, when it’s in Miami, he has friends who play hockey. But in the tournaments, if you are more or less good, you don’t really have spots to say, “OK, I go to Ibiza, to go to Machu Picchu in Peru, because I would like to be able to ski.” They cannot.

Is it easy to work with such a hard worker? Or is it not hard?

No, it’s easy. When I go to work, I understand that, I like tennis, I love what I do. I know with who I am, with whom I’m working. So if you don’t want to follow this dream, you have to get out. You have to stay online. Because I mean, if you have someone that wants to work, at the end, he’s the boss. You can give advice, but if my boss is telling me, “I want to work, I want to improve” – OK, I need to make him understand that to work properly, you need to rest.

But it’s globally easy because you don’t need to motivate Andrey. You have kids who say they want to be tennis players and they are not doing the effort that you have to do. Never with Andrey. He’s working with intensity. There is not even one day that you see from practice, “Fuck, Andrey, what happened, it’s already two days you’re not pumped, you don’t want to work?” Never, never. Hear me: never, not a single day. After a match, he’s gonna hit one hour. Tonight, he is going to ask when we start to work.

Who's in the team today?

Galo Blanco is the agent but I will say Galo is also a really important person for him. He was the guy who brought Andrey to Barcelona and he was a coach. So Galo is more than an agent. He was a player, so he trusts him so much. Galo is like an agent and coach, I will say. He is a person that really takes care of him, he’s known him since the beginning. We were travelling and sharing rooms, hours and hours in the Challengers at the beginning of our career, Karen’s career, because Galo was coaching also Dominic Thiem for years, okay, and also Raonic, so knows about everything. And then is Marcos Borderias, the fitness coach, Carlos Costa is the physio, Alberto Martin and me.

What was the best Rublev you've ever seen on the court, when was it?

In Wimbledon against Novak. He lost but it was the line that he made during the match. I will say also againt Novak at the Paris Masters, but in Paris, he was really tired, because he went to sleep at three for three or four am and they played at 4pm after. He’s had really amazing good wins, he won some tournaments in finals, and he destroyed the guys. But I wanted to compare with the guys at the top level. Another match quarter-final in Monte Carlo with Rafa on clay, was a really good win. And then of course, I like to compare with the top ones. He beat (Roger) Federer, he beat all the top players. But for me the top level is when you can say, “Fuck, this is a good match”, even if you lost.