WHAT A WASTE
I’ll have little sympathy if Evans doesn’t return from cocaine shame
BY CHANCE, I bumped into Dan Evans the night before the announcement that he’d tested positive for cocaine, and there was no inkling of what was to come.
I was walking around Kensington with my girlfriend and her daughter, and heading towards me on the same side of the pavement was Dan, with his girlfriend.
He was smiling, and friendly. ‘Hello Flossy,’ he said, referring to my nickname in the tennis world.
He cut such a relaxed figure that when I heard the news a few hours later, I didn’t believe it at first.
If it had been me with that hanging over me, knowing how stupid I’d been, I would have stayed hidden in my apartment rather than going for an evening stroll.
Different people deal with things in different ways I guess.
I’ve had mixed views of Dan over the years. I’ve always admired his talent, thought he had the ability to be a top-50 player, and gave him his debut in the Davis Cup when I was captain of the Great Britain team.
He was young and cheeky but worked hard, to be fair. I think he enjoyed the team environment and being pushed by the group. He and Andy Murray were very competitive with each other.
But over the years, he gained a reputation for being a party lad with bad practice habits. You don’t have to live like a monk to be a successful tennis player but Dan wasn’t good enough to cut corners. He would fall off the mat for months at a time. Strangely it was when he was going through a successful patch and making money that you’d hear stories.
There were rumours that he’d hired a private plane to take him off on holiday to Europe last year. Very nice and it’s his money, but did he really think he’d done enough to warrant that?
On a personal level, he also let me down a bit at this time last year. I’d fought his corner t o get him involved in Team Tennis in San Diego for three months and we’d involved him in all the promotional work and given him the chance of three months’ regular tennis after Wimbledon.
Then about 10 days before it was due to start, I got a call from his agent saying Dan was pulling out. What hurt was Dan didn’t have the courtesy or take the responsibility to tell me himself.
Of course, all that pales into insignificance compared to the latest misdemeanour and to be honest I won’t have a lot of sympathy when he is punished. Cocaine is on the list for a reason, and everybody knows it’s there.
Yes, I know when I was a player people such as Vitas Gerulaitis had lots of fun and the rules were lax, but these are completely different times.
Dan has enjoyed a wonderful life as a tennis player, blessed to make the top 50 in an era where you can make a ton of money.
He knew the risk of taking a banned substance — it doesn’t matter if it was recreational or not. The sport is very professional today and when you don’t practise or you’re out clubbing, all your rivals are hard at work.
We don’t know if taking this substance was a one-off but I have had experience of people close to me getting into trouble by going down a certain path. It’s not a good way to be.
In all probability he may have blown his career, but tennis is secondary. My concern is for his future because believe me genuinely, I absolutely want the best for him.
If he is banned for a year, it would take a superhuman effort for someone like Dan to come back — maybe it will be the making of him. But if it’s longer than a year, I think he is done and he would have nobody to blame but himself.
He’s had a lot of chances after letting his ranking yo-yo. He has to take responsibility.
My hope is he sorts his life out first. It is not a good world he’s in.