Emma Raducanu has sprung another coaching surprise by parting company with Torben Beltz.
The German, who had been in position for five months, becomes the third coach to have lost his job in a year when Raducanu has gone from A level student to global fame.
While there had been rumours in the game that he was on his way out, the timing is again surprising.
Last week Raducanu reached the quarter finals of the Stuttgart WTA event in which she put up an excellent showing against dominant world No 1 Iga Swiatek.
So far her first attempts at clay on the tour have been better than knowledgeable observers might have expected.
Beltz’s demise follows a pattern. Nigel Sears was disposed of after her fourth round showing at Wimbledon and, most surprising of all, Andrew Richardson was jettisoned after he helped her win the US Open.
However, Raducanu and her father Ian regard the business of coaching in a less orthodox way than most in the game, trying to take knowledge from a wide range of sources rather than focusing on being mentored by one person.
It is likely to be a facet of her career for the foreseeable future – and has already been the case – that she regularly mixes and matches coaching options.
‘I want to thank Torben for his dedication,’ Raducanu said.
‘He has a huge heart and I have enjoyed our strong chemistry during the time together.
‘I feel the best direction for my development is to transition to a new training model with the LTA supporting in the interim.’
Raducanu navigated her way through Wimbledon last summer with the help of Sears, whose daughter Kim is married to Andy Murray, as her temporary coach.
She made it to the fourth round at SW19 but elected to switch coaches heading into the US Open, joining forces with Richardson, one of her youth coaches.
The pair masterminded a fairytale in New York as Raducanu won her maiden Grand Slam from the qualifying rounds without dropping a set across 10 matches.
Despite that shock success in New York, Raducanu made the decision to split from Richardson because she wanted a coach with pedigree on the WTA Tour.
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Raducanu held a number of coaching trials at her home base of Bromley Tennis Centre before settling on Beltz.
During their five-month run together Raducanu, the world No 11, suffered a first round exit at the Sydney Tennis Classic in January, lost in the second round of the Australian Open to Danka Kovinic, lost in round one in Guadalajara in late February, reached the last-32 at Indian Wells, last-16 at the Miami Open and the quarter-finals in Stuttgart, where she was beaten by world No 1 Swiatek.