The Other Toni: Antonio Cascales, Unsung Guru of Spanish Tennis

Chris Lewit

You probably have never heard of Antonio Cascales. However—you may have heard of Juan Carlos Ferrero, Pablo Carreno Busta, and Carlos Alcaraz—who all have trained under his watchful eye.

He is not very well known outside of Spain, but his coaching record rivals many other top coaches in the country. He is most well-known for guiding Juan Carlos Ferrero to number 1 in the world and the 2003 Roland Garros title. Cascales coached Juan Carlos since he was about 10 years old—it's a remarkable story of how a small town coach helped a small town player became tennis champion of the world.

Founder

Cascales is also the founder, along with Juan Carlos, of the Juan Carlos Ferrero Equelite Tennis Academy, which has grown from a tiny club with 2 courts into one of the best tennis academies in the world with over 20 courts and world class facilities.

I recently had the good fortune of meeting and interviewing Antonio onsite at the JC Ferrero Equelite Academy in Villena, Spain. Cascales shared some fascinating stories, coaching insights, and he helped me to better understand the historical context for the rise of Spanish tennis on the world stage.

History

The way Antonio tells the story, the Franco regime, near the end of his rule, which ended in 1975, was entranced by the success of Manolo Santana in that era. In 1965 for example, Santana helped Spain defeat the US in Davis Cup and in that year he also reached the world #1 amateur ranking, propelling him to national celebrity.

According to Cascales, Franco felt that tennis would be the perfect sport for the masses in the middle class across the country. The image of tennis appealed to Franco and he and his administration sought to support the growth of tennis around the country and encourage everyone to play.

Prior to this time, tennis was more of a rich family sport in Spain, reserved for the wealthy families of gilded clubs in Barcelona like the Real Club de Tennis, Club Tennis Barcino and Club Tennis de La Salut, for example.

The end result was that, in the late 1960's and 1970's, there was a boom of tennis clubs and many more people from a lower social stratification began to play tennis around the country at their local clubs. By Cascales' estimation, tennis clubs in Spain expanded from 50 to over 800 clubs and participation exploded!

By the way, these events laid the grassroots foundation on which many future professional stars for Spain were built. Many of the children who picked up a racquet during this era became the champions of the 1980's and 1990's.

A School?

Cascales, himself, was a beneficiary of this new societal embrace of tennis. By 1979, he had become one of the best local players in the region outside of Alicante.

He mainly taught himself how to play and didn't have any grand mentors. The local club asked him to start a school. He replied, "Start a school? But I don't know anything!" The club leaders insisted and that is how Cascales' coaching story began, teaching himself how to teach tennis at a little club outside of a small town called Villena. He was only 18 years old.

Cascales said he slowly taught himself how to teach through trial and error and also going to seminars and conferences. He remembers that in the 1980's and early 1990's, there were many workshops to share the teachings of Willam Pato Alvarez and Lluis Bruguera, who were dominating the coaching scene in Spain during that era.

I have written about the philosophy and influence of Lluis and Pato extensively both for Tennisplayer (Click Here) and in my book, The Secrets of Spanish Tennis. Cascales learned from them and others and developed his own philosophy and methodology that he applied to his small school.

A Big Conference

Cascales remembers that he attended a big conference in 1990 where the featured speakers were Lluis Bruguera and Pato Alvarez. At that time Lluis was coaching his son Sergi Bruguera, a Spanish champion who exploded onto the ATP Tour, later winning Roland Garros twice in 1993 and 1994.

Alvarez had achieved fame for coaching many professionals like Emilio Sanchez, Javier Sanchez and Sergio Casal, among others, and at one point was coaching four players simultaneously in the ATP top 40. Cascales recalls that Lluis and Pato had big personalities and that they clashed often and did not get along with each other at the time.

In Cascales' opinion, Alvarez's system was rigid and overly structured, allowing little flexibility to customize the method for each player. Alvarez, according to Cascales, was very strict in his approach and the student either did it his way or Pato would leave the player. Cascales believes that Lluis's approach at the time was more flexible and customizable to the player. Cascales admits that his academy borrows many exercises and methods that he learned from conferences like this one.

It's interesting to note that Cascales is an excellent example of a successful Spanish coach heavily influenced by the philosophy and teachings of Lluis Bruguera and Pato Alvarez, as almost all Spanish coaches from that era were influenced, including the great Toni Nadal. Pato and Lluis were so dynamic and charismatic during that time, and garnered so much attention by their coaching successes, that the Spanish Federation (RFET) in the 1980's and 1990's codified the methods of these giants into a work system and propagated that methodology around the country through courses, conventions and certification programs.

Cascales attested that for decades the RFET courses taught these approaches and drills until collaboration with the ITF education department brought some tweaks to the coaching education program in Spain. Therefore, during a critical growth period for tennis in Spain, coaches were influenced by Lluis and Pato's personal influence and guidance, but even coaches far away from the orbit of Barcelona tennis, where Lluis and Pato were kings, like Cascales, learned many of the same drills and approaches. According to Cascales, the drills and work system introduced to the country by Pato and Lluis in the 1980's dramatically changed the trajectory of Spanish tennis and help lead to the rise of the "Spanish Armada" of top pros in the 1990's and beyond.

In 1994, Cascales founded the Equelite Academy with three students achieving very big success. Pedro Rico was a star junior and went on to a full scholarship at Pepperdine in the states. Santi Ventura became a solid ATP pro, and Juan Carlos Ferrero became number 1 in the world and won Roland Garros in 2003.

Academy Powerhouse

Based on those successes, Cascales and the academy grew. From very humble origins—2 clay courts set in the farmlands outside Villena—the academy has developed into a world powerhouse providing elite training to top professional players and juniors. It's a remarkable achievement for a coach and program operating basically in the middle of nowhere.

Cascales reminisces that in 1994 Juan Carlos was champion in Tarbes, the world junior 14U championship, and he came to live with Cascales in Villena, at the site of the current academy. The tiny club was surrounded by farming fields, orchards and vineyards on the outskirts of town.

Today that same club has over 20 courts, world-class facilities and Juan Carlos and Antonio still live onsite and oversee the training program. The academy has grown in prestige and currently has a very strong list of top juniors and ATP players who train or have trained there including Pablo Carreno-Busta, David Ferrer, Nicolas Almagro, and now the prodigy Carlos Alcaraz.

Philosophy

Cascales is unassuming, humble, and reserved. He's the kind of coach who quietly observes and from time to time shares an important nugget of wisdom. He doesn't speak too much on the court, but when he does speak it's with authority.

Perhaps he follows the famous coaching adage of Lluis Bruguera that a coach "shouldn't speak too much, but find the right exercise." He has a commanding presence only earned from the experience of years in the trenches. Juan Carlos Ferrero appears to have a similar coaching style, perhaps knowingly or unknowingly shadowing the style of his longtime mentor.

Antonio insists that the game of tennis remains relatively simple, despite scientific and technological advances. While he values research and is not afraid to evolve or resistant to change, in the end he believes the game of tennis at its core remains simple and mostly the same. That's why many of the exercises he uses like the famous Spanish X drill and La Pared (The Wall) are essentially timeless, in his opinion. Many of the exercises at the academy, Cascales admits may be influenced by Pato and Lluis and he believes it's natural to include these exercises in his work system because "they still work and are useful."

Hard Work and Docility

Cascales has no dogma—no rigid system that everyone must follow. When asked what the core of his teaching philosophy is, he replied, "Hard work and docility." Docility means the player is coachable, malleable.

Docility implies that the player respects the coach, listens to feeeback and implements it. It's essentially the ability to learn well, which the other Toni—Toni Nadal—happens to say is the most important talent of all.

The capacity to work is very important for Cascales. For him, the player must be able to sacrifice everything to improve his tennis and dedicate himself or herself to the goal.

He told a story of how a young Juan Carlos always delivered very high energy to his training and was superior in his work ethic. Cascales said that sometimes, even after four hours of work in a day, Juan Carlos still wanted more.

He was insatiable and relentless. Cascales says that Carlos Alcaraz also has these qualities. Cascales insists that one of the main aspects that has lead to Spanish success over the years is this type of "hard work and intensity in the training."

Conclusion

Perhaps those of us who teach should remember those two keys from Antonio—hard work and docility—and stop focusing so much only on the technique or other training elements. While technique and tactics are of course important, in the end the consistent engagement, growth mindset, and good old fashioned hard work are essential ingredients needed to build a champion.

How can we better develop those traits in our charges?