Roger Rasheed (born 10 March 1969) is a former

Australian rules football Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by k ...

player,

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball cov ...

player, tennis coach and tennis commentator with the

Seven Network The Seven Network (commonly known as Channel Seven or simply Seven) is a major Australian commercial free-to-air Television broadcasting in Australia, television network. It is owned by Seven West Media, Seven West Media Limited, and is one of ...

for 12 years. Rasheed is best known as Grand Slam coach of Australian former World No. 1

Lleyton Hewitt Lleyton Glynn Hewitt (born 24 February 1981) is an Australian former world No. 1 tennis player. He is the most recent Australian man to win a major singles title, with two at the 2001 US Open and 2002 Wimbledon Championships. In November 200 ...

, former World No. 6

Gaël Monfils Gaël Sébastien Monfils (; born 1 September 1986) is a French professional tennis player. He has been ranked as high as world No. 6 in singles by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), which he achieved in November 2016. His career hig ...

, former World No. 5

Jo-Wilfried Tsonga Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (; born 17 April 1985) is a French former professional tennis player. He was ranked as high as world No. 5 by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), which he achieved in February 2012. Tsonga won 18 singles titles on th ...

, former World No. 3

Grigor Dimitrov Grigor Dimitrov ( bg, Григор Димитров, ; born 16 May 1991) is a Bulgarian professional tennis player. He has been ranked as high as world No. 3 in singles by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), which he first achieved o ...

and through his own website ProTennisCoach.com. In addition, Rasheed is a media personality on Channel Seven and is the founder of the Roger Rasheed Sports Foundation.

Career

Player

Prior to his work as a coach, Rasheed was the youngest ever player to qualify for an

Australian Open The Australian Open is a tennis tournament held annually at Melbourne Park in Melbourne, Australia. The tournament is the first of the four Grand Slam tennis events held each year, preceding the French Open, Wimbledon, and the US Ope ...

in 1985 at 16 years of age, a feat eclipsed by Lleyton Hewitt, whom Rasheed later coached. Rasheed also competed in the

ATP Challenger Series The ATP Challenger Tour, known until the end of 2008 as the ATP Challenger Series, is a series of international men's professional tennis tournaments. The Challenger Tour events are the second-highest tier of tennis competition, behind the ATP T ...

and won four titles in 1992. He reached number 192 in ATP rankings and number 132 in the doubles rankings in 1992.

Coaching

In Australia, Rasheed is notable as

's coach from 2003 until 2007. During Rasheed's tenure as coach, Hewitt enjoyed significant domestic and international success, including becoming the first Australian in seventeen years to reach the

final and winning the 2006

Queen's Club Championships The Queen's Club Championships is an annual tournament for male tennis players, held on grass courts at the Queen's Club in West Kensington, London. The event is part of the ATP Tour 500 series on the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) ...

. Whilst Hewitt's coach, Rasheed also was the coach of the Australian

Davis Cup The Davis Cup is the premier international team event in men's tennis. It is run by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and is contested annually between teams from competing countries in a knock-out format. It is described by the organi ...

team in 2006. Rasheed then coached

from July 2008 to July 2011 which coincided with Monfils rise in rankings from 38 to 7 in the ATP World Rankings. Since, Rasheed coached Frenchman and former Australian Open finalist

between October 2012 and 2013. Tsonga achieved considerable success over this period, including defeating

Roger Federer Roger Federer (; born 8 August 1981) is a Swiss former professional tennis player. He was ranked world No. 1 by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) for 310 weeks, including a record 237 consecutive weeks, and finished as the year-e ...

in straight sets at the

French Open The French Open (french: Internationaux de France de tennis), also known as Roland-Garros (), is a major tennis tournament held over two weeks at the Stade Roland Garros in Paris, France, beginning in late May each year. The tournament and ve ...

. Since October 2013, Rasheed agreed to coach Bulgarian

, the most successful Bulgarian male tennis player, both in financial and ranking terms, in history. Dimitrov credited Rasheed for his success in the 2014 Australian Open. Following a run of poor results in

2015 File:2015 Events Collage new.png, From top left, clockwise: Civil service in remembrance of November 2015 Paris attacks; Germanwings Flight 9525 was purposely crashed into the French Alps; the rubble of residences in Kathmandu following the April ...

, which culminated in a straight-sets defeat to

Richard Gasquet Richard Gabriel Cyr Gasquet (; born 18 June 1986) is a French professional tennis player. His career-high ATP singles ranking is world No. 7, attained on 9 July 2007. He has won a total of 15 singles titles on the ATP Tour. His best performances ...

at Wimbledon, Rasheed parted ways with Dimitrov.

ProTennisCoach.com

With Paul Annacone,

Brad Gilbert Brad Gilbert (born August 9, 1961) is a former professional tennis player and an American tennis coach. During his career, he won 20 singles titles and achieved a career-high singles ranking of world No. 4 in 1990, and a career-high doubles rank ...

and

Darren Cahill Darren Cahill (born 2 October 1965) is a tennis coach and former professional tennis player from Australia. In addition, Cahill is a tennis analyst for the Grand Slam events on the US sports network ESPN and a coach with the Adidas Player Devel ...

, Rasheed developed ProTennisCoach.com — a professional and open coaching website launched in 2013.

Media

Rasheed regularly commentated both men's and women's matches in the

for the

between 2007 and 2018. In particular, Rasheed was known for his court-side commentary and special analysis. He now works for the broadcaster

Nine Network The Nine Network (stylised 9Network, commonly known as Channel Nine or simply Nine) is an Australian commercial free-to-air television network. It is owned by parent company Nine Entertainment and is one of five main free-to-air television netw ...

whilst working for the Tennis Australia world feed in an expert commentary role.

Foundation

In addition, Rasheed has launched the ''Roger Rasheed Sports Foundation'' a

not for profit A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...

organisation which focuses on children's health across socioeconomic and geographic boundaries.

Greg Norman Gregory John Norman AO (born 10 February 1955) is an Australian entrepreneur and retired professional golfer who spent 331 weeks as world number one in the 1980s and 1990s. He won 89 professional tournaments, including 20 PGA Tour tournament ...

is the Foundation's patron. The organisation's first project is developing the Rajah Street Community Reserve in the

City of Marion The City of Marion is a local government area in part of the southern and western suburbs of Adelaide, South Australia. The council offices are in the suburb of Sturt. History The District Council of Brighton was established in 1853, centred ...

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

Personal life

He is Australian of Lebanese descent. Born in

, Rasheed played

, including seven games in the

South Australian National Football League The South Australian National Football League, or SANFL ( or ''S-A-N-F-L''), is an Australian rules football league based in the Australian state of South Australia. It is also the state's sports governing body, governing body for the sport. O ...

(SANFL) with the

Sturt Football Club The Sturt Football Club, nicknamed The Double Blues, is a semi-professional Australian rules football club based in the suburb of Unley, South Australia, which plays in the South Australian National Football League. Founded in 1901 by the Stu ...

. He also tried to coach the Pembroke School football team. He is a keen supporter of the

Port Adelaide Football Club Port Adelaide Football Club is a professional Australian rules football club based in Alberton, South Australia, Alberton, South Australia. The club's senior men's team plays in the Australian Football League (AFL), where they are nicknamed ...

in the

Australian Football League The Australian Football League (AFL) is the only fully professional sports, professional competition of Australian rules football. Through the AFL Commission, the AFL also serves as the sport's governing body and is responsible for controlling ...

(AFL).

Challenger finals

Doubles: 5 (4–1)

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Rasheed, Roger 1969 births Living people Australian male tennis players Australian people of Lebanese descent Sportspeople of Lebanese descent Australian tennis coaches Australian rules footballers from Adelaide Tennis players from Adelaide Sturt Football Club players Australian tennis commentators Australian rules footballers from South Australia