Top official to coach Canadian star
Tennis New Zealand is looking for a new high performance director, with Christophe Lambert moving on early next month to become Bianca Andreescu’s coach.
Lambert, who took over the position from Simon Rea in March 2020, was previously the national coach at Tennis NZ, but he will leave next week to become the coach for the 2019 US Open winner.
‘‘An opportunity came to Christophe that was too good for him to turn down. So I’m excited for him about this opportunity,’’ Tennis NZ CEO Julie Paterson said.
Lambert said he was excited by the new challenge, to help the Canadian 22-year-old. ‘‘Bianca asked me to coach her and I accepted the job. It was an offer I couldn’t refuse,’’ Lambert said.
Lambert worked with Andreescu when she was younger, at a time when he was working for Tennis Canada, and they have stayed in touch over the years since.
‘‘It wasn’t like every week or every month. It’s always good to have people calling you when you are up, but when she was down I was checking on her and giving her my opinion.’’
With Lambert departing, Paterson said Tennis NZ would look at its high performance structure, to decide what sort of person they want coming in.
‘‘We are going to review our current team that’s working in high performance . . . have a look and see where our gaps are and see what we need to do to replace that role.
‘‘That will happen over the next four to six weeks.’’
Lambert wasn’t replaced as national coach when he moved into the high performance director role, although due to Covid-19 and the border situation, there was less need for a fulltime coach to travel the world with the country’s best young players.
But since the borders have been open Lambert has spent a lot of time travelling and Paterson said this was also something that will be taken into consideration when making the next appointment.
Tennis NZ is still largely working inside the structures set up by Rea for its player development, identification and pathways, although some modifications were made to it under Lambert’s leadership. Whoever comes in, will be expected to continue with what’s already been established, rather than starting from scratch.
‘‘The board are very committed to the approach of our high performance development throughout the country,’’ Paterson said. ‘‘We continue to review and revise as we go, but at the moment we’re not seeing a significant change.’’
New Zealand hasn’t had a woman ranked inside the top 100 in singles since Marina Erakovic dropped out of it in 2015, while you have to go back to Brett Steven in 1997 to find the last Kiwi male with a top 100 singles ranking.