Former junior world No.1’s Daria and Luke Saville spoke on The Sit-Down podcast about life on tour and their coaching aspirations.
Melbourne, VIC, 7 November 2024 | Jackson Mansell
Daria and Luke Saville have mastered the art of tour life for the best part of a decade.
Constantly travelling, the pair have found ways to maximise the amount of time spent together, despite both having professional tennis careers.
During a rare week together in Melbourne, the Savilles spoke on The Sit-Down podcast about how they navigate life on tour.
“It varies from probably 15 to 25 weeks [per year] something like that. But to be honest, we’ve been dating for so many years and especially early days in juniors, we weren’t seeing much of each other at all,” Luke explained.
“It just comes with the business, and I think that we both know what it takes to play professional tennis and a lot of that is travel so we both get it, and I think it actually really works well and we can bounce ideas off each other.”
An Aussie tennis power couple 💪 @Daria_gav 💙 @LukeSaville18
Sitting down with the Saville’s 👉https://t.co/Q6r3Caro4t 🎧 pic.twitter.com/c2ndWjk22G
— #AusOpen (@AustralianOpen) November 4, 2024
It’s a reality Daria and Luke have been forced to deal with from the moment they began seeing each other. Meeting in Mexico in 2009 at the Junior Davis and Fed Cup Finals, their relationship has only known tennis. For the first three years, Daria was living in Russia, meaning they spent little time together early on.
“There was a time where we didn’t see each other for a year, like literally Australian Open juniors and then the following year, something like that, but we just kept in touch. I think when I turned 18, that’s when I moved to Australia so that made things a lot easier,” Daria said.
On The AO Show Weekly podcast last week, Luke hinted at potentially retiring after Australian Open 2025. Having previously coached Daria at a couple of tournaments, the 30-year-old would be interested in pursuing a coaching career.
“The appreciation of how hard tennis is for me over the last few years, that just shows that probably helps me sort of relax a bit more and just know that she’s doing her best and whatever happens, happens,” Luke said of the experience coaching his wife.
“I’m hoping maybe one day it’s a route I could possibly go down.”
Daria made it to the final in Granby in 2022 with Luke as coach, highlighting his attributes as a coach.
“Luke is a lot more patient [than me],” Daria said. “I think I listen to [Luke]. Even on the court when we practice together, we’ll have our coaches there, but we will still chat.”
Coaching is a path Daria is keen about pursuing at the end of her career, as she aspires to guide the next generation.
“I do think sometimes I would like to coach, be someone’s mentor [for] a young junior, especially a female,” the Billie Jean King Cup team member said.
It’s something at which Luke believes Daria would excel.
“One day if you decide to coach, you’d have to work on the delivery [of your message],” he joked, before adding: “Your tennis mind is great. Your tennis IQ out on the court and all that.
“I think you try and almost escape from tennis a little bit but when you actually do [speak about tennis], it’s great information.”
You can listen to the full episode of The Sit-Down podcast here.