Ben Shelton has been told he has some clear improvements to make after his second round defeat at Roland Garros.
Shelton won a clay court title in Munich, where he beat the likes of Flavio Cobolli and Joao Fonseca to claim his biggest career title on the surface.
Since winning the ATP 500 tournament, Shelton has only won two of his next six matches on clay, which culminated in a 6-4, 7-5, 6-4 defeat to world number 62 Raphael Collignon.
Shelton was unable to take advantage of Sinner’s shock defeat at Roland Garros, and now Andy Roddick has told his compatriot what he needs to change.
Andy Roddick tells Ben Shelton he was rushing too much in Roland Garros defeat
Shelton has not lost in the second round of a Grand Slam since 2023, with the world number five reaching two major semifinals in the time since then.
When reacting to Shelton’s defeat on the ‘Served with Andy Roddick‘ podcast, Roddick explained that it felt like the 23-year-old was rushing.
Roddick theorised that this was as a result of Shelton previously having to go for his shots more, but he claimed that he does not need to this anymore due to the improvements he has made to his game, and advised him to be more patient in future and make matches more physical.
Where does Jannik Sinner’s defeat to Juan Manuel Cerundolo rank among the most shocking results in tennis history?
“I watched the whole match. It seemed like Ben was in a rush to finish a point or to come in or do something,” said Roddick. It’s going to be a bit of a weird learning curve, because I think he used to have to make something happen all the time because his backhand was not as good as it is now.
“As that shot improves, there was a million adjustments made and not one of them was let’s make a bunch of balls and make this guy hit me off the court.
“Collignon played great by the way, he was in the flow, he did an amazing job. And he was not burning Ben with that forehand line, there was no threat of him pulling the trigger. He was hooking it to Ben’s forehand and even when he was going line, it was tailing to Ben’s forehand.
“If you are Ben I wish he would think this guy is not going to bruise me to the forehand side and if he does he is taking risk.
“He was awkward at net today, he was missing some. And everyone does. But I think the next evolution of Ben’s game is that he needs to have more faith in being very physical, very in shape and realise when someone is not hurting him off a given wing.
“Collignon all he wanted Ben to do was force it so that he could recreate and not create his own deal. If Ben goes back and has that trajectory on his forehand it is going to bother a lot of people, but stay in that rally and make people prove they can get out of it.
That will be learned in time and he will be dangerous on the grass. The next version of Ben and one that lives in the three to five [in the world] is one that can extend rallies when he needs to and at least stress test that option against someone else.
“He should never open with giving someone rhythm, that was a mistake that I made a million times, but if it’s not working and we have four sets to figure it out, let’s see if we can get to someone’s legs.”
What is next for Ben Shelton?
Shelton’s clay court season is now over after a disappointing Roland Garros, as he now looks ahead to the grass court season.
Grass has been a mixed bag for Shelton so far, having won 12 of his 23 professional matches on the surface.
Eight of those 12 wins for Shelton have come at Wimbledon, while he has only won four of his 12 grass court matches on the ATP Tour.
Shelton will be hoping to change this at the Stuttgart Open, where he reached the semifinals last year and is scheduled to return as the second seed, alongside Nick Kyrgios, who is making his return to tennis at the ATP 250 tournament.
The American is then expected to remain in Germany, with Shelton scheduled to make his debut at the Halle Open ahead of Wimbledon.
