Rune’s mother reveals: “We chose Luthi because he won 20 Slams with Federer”

Interviewed by the podcast The Craig Shapiro Tennis, Aneke Rune, mother of the young Danish talent Holger Rune, tried to give an explanation to the separation between the young tennis player and his coach Severin Luthi.

Aneke has followed Holger since the beginning of his career and has a very important role in his growth. Some have placed the blame for this separation on her, recalling among other things Jannik Sinner’s words regarding the freedom granted by her parents, who were totally absent from a tennis point of view.

“We were naive in making some decisions but we also thought about the fact that he had been Roger Federer’s coach. I thought: damn he won 20 Slams with Roger! While we are maximum number 7 in the world. He can give us a lot,” said Aneke, who explained the choice to separate from Luthi.

Among other things, Holger Rune’s mother clarified that there were totally different points of view between the parties. On the one hand Luthi wanted to see a calmer Holger without wasting energy. On the other hand, she and Holger think this is one of Rune’s best qualities and it’s not about wasting energy.

Severin Luthi and Roger Federer© Clive Brunskill / Staff Getty Images Sport

It is surprising that, only a week after Luthi’s farewell, Boris Becker also said goodbye to the Rune staff prematurely. Now, who will be the Dane’s next coach? But the real question is: will Rune be able to make the leap in quality, like Alcaraz and Sinner did?

Runes between ups and downs

The Danish tennis player is one of the youngest talents on the ATP Tour. Many consider him to be the most interesting young player on NextGen, after the Slam champions Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner.

Compared to the Italian Holger seemed to have something more until a few months ago, but then things dramatically changed. While Jannik plays and wins almost with an ATP No.1 performance, Rune alternates ups and downs, sometimes also due to annoying physical problems.

In recent months Holger has made headlines for a series of sensational arrivals and farewells among his staff. Rune first announced the entry of Severin Luthi and Boris Becker into the staff and then, after just a few weeks, the parties announced their separation.

Both Luthi and Becker spoke of little time available to follow the tennis player, but in the end no common ground was found and – especially with Roger Federer’s former coach – the collaboration ended almost immediately.