Andre Agassi’s father Mike once opened up about the crucial advice he had for Venus and Serena Williams during a challenging phase in their careers. After a period of dominating at the Majors, neither of the Williams sisters won a Grand Slam singles title in 2004 and had fallen out of the top 5 as the end of the year neared.
In an interview with Tennis Week at the time, Andre Agassi’s dad Mike revealed that he had warned Richard Williams that Venus and Serena Williams were struggling because they trained with men. He asserted competing with men, which required a lot of power and muscle, had a detrimental impact on the sisters by making them lose their serve and confidence.
“I was talking with Serena’s father and I said: “the reason your daughters are losing is because they are practicing with men.” With the men, they hit the big shot that would be the winner against the women, but the men return it,” he said.
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"You hit the big serve and the man returns, hit bigger and the men still returns it. You try to hit bigger and bigger until the ball goes out. Then you lose your serve and you lose your confidence," he added. "Their game has gone down. They hit, once in a while, great balls, but their game has gone down a bit," he added.
With Anastasia Myskina, Maria Sharapova and Svetlana Kuznetsova winning three of the four Majors that season, Agassi said that the success of the Russian WTA stars came from regularly competing against one another.
"The Russian girls compete against each other and you see Russian girls win three of the four Grand Slams this year. They are absolutely not half of the talent of Serena Williams and Venus Williams. Serena Williams and Venus Williams don't have their confidence on their shots anymore," he said.
Agassi cautioned Venus and Serena Williams to stop practicing with men if they wanted to regain their dominance. He suggested that American women wrongly believed that practicing with male players would improve their game and advised the sisters to train with women instead.
"Stop practicing with the men. Serena and Venus, stop practicing with the men. Most of our American girls think if they practice with the men, he's a better player, then I'll get better. In some ways, yes, you get better playing with the better player. But you have to hit the ball — not just the big ball, but other shots (angles) — to see if the women can return it or not," he said.
"I would like to see them play one women, Serena or Venus, against too good players on the other side in practice. Practice against two of them and if you can make the point against two good women then you can make the point against any of these girls in the world," he added.
"In practice, all Serena Williams did was play guys" - Childhood coach Rick Macci
Interestingly, Serena Williams preferred to train with male players, according to her childhood coach Rick Macci. He shared that the American wasn't intimidated by any opponent and would even beat male players who were much older than her.
"In practice, all Serena did was play guys. She beat guys three to four years older than her. It didn't matter who was on the other side of the net. She didn't look at it like this girl is ranked this or that guy is 16," Macci said.
Macci also disclosed that Williams had made the bold claim that she was a better player than John McEnroe when she was just 11 years old.
"At 11, she told me she thought she was better than John McEnroe. She said, 'Did you ever see his strokes? He has terrible strokes. I can beat him for sure.' It was silly, but she meant it from the heart. And she believed it. A great competitor is borderline cocky and courageous," he added.
Meanwhile, Serena Williams has spoken about beating Andy Roddick 6-1 in a match when they were 10 years old, with the duo sharing humorous banter about the encounter.
Venus Williams and Father Richard recall one match that 7-time Grand Slam champion "should have won"
