Running drills. Feeding balls. Hoping it would transfer.
Most of the time, it didn’t. That gap between practice and performance became the driving force behind everything I now teach.
I grew up on the football pitch. Tennis was something we played for fun during the summer, never something I imagined would shape my future.
Everything changed when I took a summer coaching job at a local leisure centre. No one wanted to lead the tennis sessions, so I stepped in.
No baskets. No rigid drills. Just games, creativity and interaction.
The kids loved it — and deep down, I knew there was something important in that.
After six weeks of “fixing” a player’s serve, it looked incredible in practice.
Then came the match. Three double faults later, it collapsed.
At first I blamed the player. But lockdown forced me to stop, reflect and question something much deeper:
What if the problem wasn’t the player?
What if the problem was the practice itself?
Ecological dynamics. Constraints-led coaching. Representative learning design. Affordances. Perception-action coupling.
Suddenly, the disconnect between practice and competition made sense.
Players do not simply need more repetition. They need environments that invite perception, decision-making, adaptation and intention.
That discovery completely changed how I coach, teach and design practice.
For more than 25 years I have coached across grassroots, performance and coach development environments.
My work now focuses on online tennis coach education, ecological dynamics and helping coaches bridge the gap between research and real-world practice.
Years coaching
Sport & Exercise research
Coach education speaker
Academic coaching work
This presentation from the Tennis South Africa Coaches Conference explores ecological dynamics, intention, attention and practice design through a practical coaching lens.
Join the Academy for modern tennis coach education, practical coaching frameworks and match-ready practice design ideas.