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I hope you had the chance to enjoy the festive season!

I spent a great couple of weeks with family before a busy start to the year working at the Aussie Open.

It was also great to see my colleague at MTT Pat Flynn experiencing being a member of the winning Canadian ATP Cup Team in Sydney.

It's sure great to be back in the thick of things in 2022 :-)

With that in mind, let's start this year's communications with what I believe is one of the most important understandings we can achieve when trying to respond well to difficult situations.

And it comes from a simple Aussie Open post match comment from Rafa Nadal. He said:

"Everybody has doubts, everybody feels frustrations....the most important thing is how you react"

So why are these comments so vital?

Well, usually when we think about the word 'acceptance' we are considering the skill of overt/external acceptance.

An example of this is when a player makes a mistake and 'accepts' the mistake and move on to the next...

With has comeback for the ages Tsitsipas became only the 2nd player to come back from 2 sets down to win against Nadal at a Slam...

A truly incredible effort! 

First to hang on when in terrible trouble against a surging Nadal...And then himself achieving a mind boggling level throughout the 2nd half of the match...

Having listened to Tsitsipas's post-match press conference, I have 2 important reflections.

You can hear my thoughts here...

Another Rafa Nadal French Open looked less likely at the beginning of the tournament as he reported feeling frustrated with the tournament balls and cool conditions.

He openly discussed his doubts whether he could win the tournament given these challenges.

Yet at the end of the tournament he stood as the champion once again following one of the best Grand Slam finals performances in the history of the sport. 

Check out the key learning I took from his remarkable victory:

Wow...what a match!

Nadal was at his incredibly tough best and my sense that Kyrgios is finally making great progress towards becoming an effective competitor to complement his crazy physical talents looks more and more likely to be the case.

Here are 2 vital lessons to take from the match:

1.) Nadal shows again that choking is usually not fatal if you can respond well to the common experience of trying to finish close matches.

In tonight’s match, when Nadal realized that the finish line was in sight when leading in the 3rd set tie-break and again when he was serving for the match at 5-4 in the 4th set he suddenly tightened…A couple of double faults and playing more tentatively, along with Kyrgios's great fighting spirit, allowed Kyrgios to win the 3rd and prolong the 4th. 

But, as usual, to Nadal's huge credit he recovered from both chokes quickly  and got the job done…

There are a few key things we want to remember when trying to...

When I was a child I fell in love with tennis. I fell in love with the challenge... I fell in love with the fun... I fell in love with the competing...I fell in love with the camaraderie and much more. To this day all I need to do is picture in my mind walking into the outback tennis centres where I played most of my junior tournaments to trigger great joy.

For those of us who love tennis, watching the men's US Open final was a great reminder of why that is...Watching Rafa resist Medvedev's incredible fightback, like all great Grand Slam battles, shows us that ultimately it is the greatest sporting test. No other sport tests the physical, technical, tactical, and mental elements so completely.  

And this match proved to be the ultimate mental test. The physical demands, the pressure, trying to hang on when behind, trying to finish when in front, , the doubts, the wandering mind, the frustrations...It had it all :-)

This match was also a reminder that we...

During the 2018 clay court season, Rafael Nadal broke another amazing record, becoming the first male player to win 50 straight sets on any one surface. Consider that in his last 46 sets on clay before yesterday, no opponent had reached a tie-break against him and just once had someone achieved a 7-5 loss and his mind boggling run seems even more astonishing.

It got me reflecting on the mental attribute required to achieve such a feat and one stood out.

 Relentlessness…

Andre Agassi described this attribute well in his book: ‘Open’. He said this about the difference between the great champions and the rest:

“The more you can be present on every point. I think that’s why you see great champions separate themselves at the end of a set or at the end of a match, because they are the ones that aren’t changing in their execution. They are not assigning a value to any one point more than another. It is about what they do...

Watching Nadal and Kyrgios in the final of Beijing highlighted the contrast in 1 vital mental skill that we often fail to understand. Let’s explore it…

Nadal Is Actually Getting Better…

It’s hard to believe but Nadal is actually getting better. He is a competitive machine… Simply the greatest competitor the game has ever seen.

Last night is the best I’ve ever seen him play on a hard court. That he turned up to this rather minor tournament (for him) at this stage of his career and displayed the same desire to win as if it was a Slam is the very reason he has become so good and continues to improve.

His insanely high level had Kyrgios looking for an exit within 30mins.

Kyrgios Is Deeply Addicted to Reducing Fear and Pain…

The reasons that Nadal has become so great are many. But 1 of the most important that sets him apart from all but Federer is his consistent, career long ability to tolerate the fears that come with...

The 8^thDay of the Australian Open showed how even the best professional players aren’t immune from hitting the mental wall.

First it was Dominic Thiem winning a total of 4 more games when leading Goffin 7-5 6-6 (4-4 in tie breaker)…

Next it was Istomin who, since shocking Djokovic, had continued his impressive display with a 3^rdround victory and was then leading Dimitrov 6-2 6-6 from which point he won only 3 more games…

And next, Bautista Agut had fought his way back after losing the 1^stset against Raonic 6-7, to win the next 6-3 and find himself at 4-4 in the 3^rdwith several break point chances to serve for a 2 sets to 1 lead…He won only 1 more game from that point…

And finally, with Nadal stumbling as he neared the finish line Monfils suddenly found himself back in the match with a big chance to take it to a 5^thset serving at 4-3 30-0 in the 4^th…He failed to win another game.

Together this group of players (Thiem, Istomin,...

At the end of this match I was left both dumbfounded and dizzy after witnessing an incredible comeback from 2 sets and a break down, including 7 straight breaks in the  5^thset, and finally an insane level of play to finish the fairytale. Watching Fognini point to his head and pump his heart as he looked to his supporters to signify his massive mental effort left chills..

John McEnroe summed up the collective feeling well when he remarked, “That was one of the greatest, most spectacular comebacks you’re ever going to see…The level of play to mount that miraculous comeback will be remembered for a long time.”

But what allowed this moment to unfold when Rafa had previously been a perfect 151-0 when leading by 2 sets in Slams?

I contend that, during the crucial 3^rdset, based on these players' combined recent histories, 2 key psychological factors consecutively unfolded to give Fognini a chance at the unbelievable; when; if faced with the...