When I hear about 'projects' with very young kids it drives me crazy," says Pouille

Lucas Pouille had the opportunity to write the preface for the new book by journalist Quentin Moynet, 'The Hidden Side of Tennis'. In it, he shares his perspective on professional tennis and how he experienced it.

He also talks about young children whose dream is to become professional players and who are subjected to strict frameworks at a very young age.

He states: "At those ages, tennis absolutely needs to be a game. When I hear about 'projects' with very young kids, where everything is already very professional, very serious, it drives me crazy.

Sometimes, I'm in clubs, I see 9-year-old kids already very structured, everything around them is already very formatted. Whereas they should be playing, having fun. They need to want to go on the court, to create.

You have time if you want to do that later on. You can't know if you want to make a career out of it at 7 or 8 years old. At 6 years old, you haven’t decided to become a pro!

You can tell yourself: ‘I want to be a champion’, but you don't know what training is. I really see fewer and fewer kids playing.

I'm afraid it might be getting lost a bit.