‘I Can’t Hit a Forehand’ – Frances Tiafoe Reveals How He Adopted His Unconventional Style of Play

Frances Tiafoe is known for his strong on-court game. Turning pro in 2015, the American has played some memorable matches over the years. To date, the 24-year-old has won one singles title, the 2018 Delray Beach. Apart from that, he has also been a runner-up in two other ATP events.

Tiafoe is known for his solid game, one aspect of his game that has for long been talked about is his forehand. The 24-year-old American has an unconventional forehand. Recently, speaking in a podcast, Tiafoe opened up on his forehand style, elaborating on how he first adopted it.

The unconventional forehand of Tiafoe

Tiafoe recently featured in a Spotify original podcast titled ‘The Rennae Stubbs Tennis Podcast’. During the conversation, Rennae Stubbs, a former Australian player and the coach of Eugenie Bouchard, brought to light Tiafoe’s forehand. Now a tennis commentator, Rennae asked Tiafoe about his unconventional form of forehand, and where did it come from. Going further, she also compared Tiafoe’s forehand with that of Ernests Gulbis.

Answering the question, Tiafoe went back in time, recalling a tournament he played in France. The American asserted that prior to that tournament, he had a normal forehand. “I used to have a normal forehand. I’ll never forget I played this tournament, Les petits AS in France.” 

He further went on confessing that seeing the forehand of the players on tour, he used to make fun of them. He opened up on how he used to copy the forehand of players. In continuation, he also revealed how he used to react to his coach’s advice of not copying the forehands of players. He said, “I was like…jumping around and making fun of these forehands on the tour. I would always go and do that. I would see guys on tour here. So, I would copy a bunch of guys, coaches coaching that you need to stop doing that because it messes up the stroke. I was like…man…c’mon man.”

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Going further, the 2018 Delray Beach champion revealed that due to copying the forehand of multiple players, he suddenly couldn’t hit a forehand. He then opened up about the things he did to get back his stroke, before finally revealing how he adopted his current style of forehand.

“All of a sudden, I can’t hit a forehand. So I’m trying a bunch of things. I’m just messing around. I’m hitting balls on the walls for like hours. Then I was joking around and swinging like that and it felt nice. Here we are.”  

Frances Tiafoe so far in 2022

Tiafoe has been struggling to find form since the beginning of the 2022 season. He started his season with a second-round loss in Adelaide 1, followed by a first-round loss in Adelaide 2. His poor run of form continued as he suffered a second-round exit at the hands of Taylor Fritz at the Australian Open.

Following his loss in Melbourne, the young American made a return to the tour at the Sunshine Double, in search of a decent run at the Masters 1000 events. However, the 24-year-old succumbed to Round-of-32 and Round-of-16 exits in Indian Wells and Miami respectively.

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With hard court season done and dusted, the American should be hoping for some resurgence in the upcoming clay-court swing. He will begin his campaign on the red dirt at the US Men’s Clay Court Championships in Houston from Monday.