'THE TAXI DRIVER'

When someone has a win at anything in life, every man and his dog wants to have a piece of the victory.
But maybe that's just human nature as everyone who has ever rubbed shoulders with a winner believes that their 'influence' may just have been the touch of gold that made all the difference on game day.
Take for example the recently played French Open Tennis Championships where a Social Media organization liked to believe that their time with the runner up made all the difference to their rapidly improving career.
Let me explain;
Two years ago, Marketa Vondrousova of the Czech Republic played a tournament in the Land Down Under, not a big event, just a stepping stone event for budding professionals, an event that the World has a seemingly never-ending amount of.
They are called Challenger Events and just about every Country in the World has them but it's all about the timing as far as some are concerned as they look to claim their part of tennis success. 
So it seems that one tournament, in particular, believes that their little event paved the way for Marketa to become a Grand Slam semifinalist, simply because that was one of the events she participated in on her road to tennis success.

Let's just say that it is part of the same organization who lay claim to being part of Roger Federer's success at the Australian Open a couple of years ago. Just quietly, they couldn't wait to get their mugshot in the newspapers as they did their best to explain that Roger graced their courts in the lead up to the Oz Open so therefore they are taking some of the credit.
I live in a small town that owns several organizations who love to take credit for a win by anyone in any field and over the years there have been some absolute classics. In some articles, the player who has had some success on the big stage is still referred to as 'a product of'....
So do these 'accolade claimers' in fact have a point or are they simply full of their own self-importance?
In my most humble of opinions this is my point of view;
If you were the one who first taught a player to hold a racket, kick a ball, bend it like Beckham or run like the Bolt then sure, I believe that you can lay claim to an accolade. If you took a player from another coach and that player's success level was rather modest until he or she started to excel then you can look at it in two ways;
The initial coach did the hard work and you simply came along after that hard technique work had been done and helped with the tactical side.
OR;
You took that player from a wasted talent and turned them into a champion through your own way of teaching.
Which way do you want to look at it?
I wrote a post some time ago regarding Stan Wawrinka's win in the French Open and Magnus Norman's rather humble view on the part he played in it all. Sure Magnus was Stan's coach at the time however even Magnus admitted that he did not teach Stan how to hit a ball so therefor Stan's initial tennis coaches should take much of the credit.
Nicely said Magnus.
So to the 'accolade claimer';
We all yearn for success, to be known as a link in the chain of success, to have been part of an event that was lucky enough to have had a champion grace your courts in the years prior to that player's success.
But please be honest with yourself;
Only certain organizations or coaches can really lay claim to have had any real impact on a player's success. The rest are simply part of the chain, sort of like a Taxi Driver who offers a hint of their 'expertise' as an armchair expert on a trip from the airport to an event.
Be honest with yourself, did you really help and were you a fair dinkum part of it all or were you simply a Taxi Driver?