Riccardo Piatti

Riccardo Piatti (born November 8, 1958) is an Italian tennis coach. He has coached several players ranked within the top 10 by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), including Novak Djokovic, Ivan Ljubičić, Richard Gasquet, and Milos Raonic.

Riccardo Piatti

Early life

Piatti began playing tennis at the age of nine at the tennis club of Villa d'Este in Cernobbio, Italy.[1] The idea of becoming a tennis coach first occurred to him around age 20 when the head coach of the Villa d'Este tennis club became injured, and Piatti was asked to replace him.[1]

He spent formative years learning to coach at the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy (which was later absorbed into IMG Academy), in Bradenton, Florida.[1]

Coaching career

Piatti began as a private coach for professional players in 1988. Among the early players he coached are Renzo Furlan (career-high world No. 19),[2] Cristiano Caratti (career-high world No. 26),[3] and Omar Camporese (career-high world No. 18).[4]

He began working with Ivan Ljubičić in June 1997,[5] when Ljubičić was ranked No. 954 in the world.[6] This relationship lasted until the end of Ljubičić's professional playing career in 2012. Ljubičić achieved a career-high ranking of world No. 3 while working with Piatti.[6]

From fall 2005 until June 2006, he also coached Novak Djokovic when the Serb was 18. Djokovic parted ways due to Piatti's refusal to work full-time with him. In 2011, Piatti claimed that he knew then (in 2006) that Djokovic "could become number one in the world at the level of Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer because Novak always worked hard as a kid, with the family, and he was very focused and determined to be world number one."[7]

In February 2011, while still coaching world No. 14 Ljubičić, Piatti began to co-coach Richard Gasquet (with Sébastien Grosjean), who was then ranked No. 31 in the world.[8] With Piatti, Gasquet improved to a high ranking of world No. 9, short of his career high No. 7 (achieved in 2007).[9] Piatti ended the relationship abruptly in November 2013 during the season-ending 2013 ATP World Tour Finals.[10][11][12]

On December 1, 2013, he began working with Milos Raonic, co-coaching with former student Ivan Ljubičić.[11] At that time, Raonic held an ATP world ranking of No. 11. With Piatti, his ranking rose to a career-high of No. 3.[13] Five times Grand Slam champion, Maria Sharapova started working with Piatti in 2019 and they announced on November 8th that they would work together for 2020. He is currently the coach of Jannik Sinner, the 2019 #NextGenATP Finals champion.

Piatti is involved with tennis schools, club teams, and summer's clinics on Elba, Italy.[10]

References
  1. Mirco Jeraci (July 30, 2014). "Riccardo Piatti: 'No way you do not win'" (in Italian). spazziotennis.com. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
  2. "Renzo Furlan: Bio". ATP. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
  3. "Cristiano Caratti: Bio". ATP. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
  4. "Piatti Tennis Team". sporting.to.it. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
  5. "Ivan Ljubičić: Bio". ATP. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
  6. "Ivan Ljubičić: ATP Rankings History". ATP. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
  7. Mark Meadows (May 26, 2011). "INTERVIEW-Tennis-Djokovic's ex-coach expected Serb's rise". Reuters. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
  8. "Gasquet avec Piatti" (in French). eurosport.fr. February 16, 2011. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
  9. "Richard Gasquet: ATP Rankings History". ATP. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
  10. Bob Larson. "Piatti Reveals His Reason For Dumping Gasquet". 10sballs.com. Retrieved January 31, 2016.CS1 maint: location (link)
  11. Damien Cox. "Milos Raonic hopes new coach will help bring breakthrough in 2014". thestar.com. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
  12. "Richard Gasquet dumped by coach". ESPN. November 9, 2013. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
  13. "Milos Raonic: ATP Rankings History". ATP. Retrieved January 31, 2016.
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