WIMBLEDON -- Frances Tiafoe, the 20-year old son of distressed immigrants from Sierra Leone, has always been a great story. He's now taking significant steps toward becoming a great tennis player.
"This was a good long time coming," Tiafoe said yesterday, after his well-crafted second-round win over veteran Frenchman Julien Benneteau at Wimbledon, 4-6, 6-4, 6-3, 6-2. "I've had rough draws in (Grand) Slams, even here I had a tough first round (against a seed, No. 30 Fernando Verdasco). But I played well today and bounced back great after losing the first set."
This is Tiafoe's best Grand Slam result yet, and while he's just vying for a third-round berth, he's come to a major realization -- this time at the most closely watched tournament on the calendar. "The next few seasons (on grass) are pretty crucial for me," he said. "I think can make some damage."
The education of Frances Tiafoe will have to become a pretty compelling saga to match his inspirational life story, that of a laborer's son whose first home (shared with his father and a twin brother, Franklin) was an illegally occupied office room in a building at the Junior Tennis Champions Center in College Park, Md. -- the place where Tiafoe would watch and learn from the privileged campers, and ultimately eclipse them all with his own game.
The saga of how that has come to pass has endeared Tiafoe to legions of fans, but it caused him some incidental harm as well. About two years ago he found himself in what he calls a "rut," his fame greater than his accomplishments, his identity threatened by expectations that gave him an inflated image of himself while his shortcomings as a player eroded his love of the game. "I got caught up in that status," he wrote in the Players Tribune. "I needed to get back to how it was when I was a kid -- just having fun out there."
Tiafoe realized he needed a real, reliable friend. The one who stood by his side and would be there day-after-day was a fellow aspiring pro from Great Britain, Zack Evenden. He became Taifoe's hitting partner and roommate, assistant coach to the USTA's Robby Ginepri. Tiafoe has made great strides over the last year-and-a-half; he won his first ATP Tour title this spring at Delray Beach and is the youngest -- by at least five years -- of the five top-ranked Americans. He's ranked at a career-high No 52. and took giant steps on grass these weeks.
Tiafoe first played on grass when he was 14, before his first trip to Wimbledon. The occasion was a tennis exhibition at one of the Washington, D.C., embassies, which happened to have a grass court. "I hated it at first," Tiafoe said. "It was very low bouncing. It was quick. I didn't even think it was tennis. It took some time to get my head wrapped around it."
Time -- as in six years worth of time. Tiafoe admitted that right up until this year his focus on clay and hard courts left him thinking of grass as a novelty, the segment culminating at Wimbledon a mere "pastime." It's not that now.
The change in his attitude started when Tiafoe was ushered out of the French Open a few weeks ago in the first round in straight sets by Sam Querrey. He had won exactly one match in Wimbledon's main draw previously, but he resolved that this year it would be different. He wasn't going to go winless at the two mid-summer majors.
Everden and Tiafoe returned immediately from Paris to London and hunkered down at Evenden's parents' home. They decided against playing in the grass event at Stuttgart, focusing instead on getting a better feel for the grass-court game.
"We put in a good two weeks, really worked," Tiafoe said. "We got to the point where I started to think a few shots ahead, so I went to Queens (where Tiafoe reached the quarterfinals) really feeling great."
They also enjoyed living in a proper home and eating the home-cooked meals prepared by Evenden's mother -- that is, if you can describe buffalo chicken wings as such. "Well, they made a lot of wings for me," Tiafoe admitted. "I'm a big wings guy. Give me wings and I'll be quiet for half-an-hour, taking care of business."
Getting Tiafoe to remain silent for 30 minutes is no mean feat. He's garrulous, his rapid diction a big surprise as it comes packaged in a basso profundo voice. He's got a twinkle in his eye and he laughs easily, but even standing near him you can feel his kinetic energy. Tiafoe is explosive, which also means that he's the kind of player who needs a measure of calibrating and dampening.
Ginepri, Tiafoe's coach, has been working on smoothing out the peaks and valleys. He's tried to impress on Tiafoe the degree to which the men he'll need to beat are dialed in, point-after-point. Together, they've also done considerable work on Tiafoe's serve, getting him to develop a more consistent toss with a straighter left arm, making sure the toss goes high enough and sufficiently far forward.
"I think I'm good at knowing what an opponent will do next, I'm a pretty good problem solver," Tiafoe said. "I'm very aware of what's going on, what they can accomplish against you. The way I started today and the way I ended was two different Tiafoes."
Tiafoe got off to a sleepy start, dumping too many balls wide or into the net. He felt he got stiffed by a few line calls, and when he lost the first set on an unsuccessful diving volley he dropped an F-bomb that earned him an immediate Code of Conduct warning. But he offloaded the frustration successfully and settled in, found the range on his serve and forehand, and pulled away. Tiafoe played big points well, winning six of seven break points while keeping Benneteau to two of four.
Next, Tiafoe will meet fellow rising star Karen Khachanov, in an intriguing match-up between two players who spank the ball. He feels he's ready, with wiles as well as weapons at his disposal.
"I'm serving well, I can cut the angles well, I have a little shovel backhand that kind of skips in the grass," he explained. "That sets up my forehand. I'm coming forward, being sneaky, staying lower -- like you have to on grass. That's a little tough for me because I usually like to play straight up. But you gotta do what you gotta do."