On the day that Tim Henman was introduced as the BBC's latest tennis voice behind the Wimbledon microphone, so David Felgate, his erstwhile coach, was involved in a story that could become one of the talking points of SW19 this summer.

Felgate travels to Florida this weekend to begin coaching Nicole Vaidisova, the 18-year-old from the Czech Republic, whose form has slipped in the past few weeks to the extent that she chose to part company with Alex Kodat, her stepfather who has been her coach since she set out on her tennis journey at the age of six.

Having been handed a number of high-profile options, Vaidisova, currently No.17 on the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour, decided she would like to begin working with Felgate, who spent two years as the director of coaching at the LTA before he became one of the first victims of the current regime, led by chief executive Roger Draper. In what is a real fillip for the oft-maligned profile of British coaches, Felgate's credentials were such that Vaidisova's head was turned.

They will practice together for a couple of weeks at the Nick Bollettieri academy in Bradenton, before spending a few days in London at the Sutton Tennis Academy where Vaidisova will complete her preparations for clay court tournaments in Berlin and Rome prior to the French Open, which starts in late May.

Oliver van Lindonk, Vaidisova's manager, said yesterday: "Nicole has been struggling a bit recently, she lost in the first round of both Indian Wells and Key Biscayne and said she wanted to spend a week away from the game getting her head together. She has been back this past week working harder than ever, doing fitness work twice a day and really excelling in practice.

"She will be 19 in a couple of weeks but she is a very mature 19, she had to make a big decision to part with Alex but she also needed to feel she could maximise her talents with the right coach. In many ways, David is similar to Alex, he is a person she respects tremendously, he is a calm individual but won't shy away from behind very frank about what he thinks she will need to do.

"And he is a coach who she knows will have the same goals for her that she has for herself. She is not just looking to return to the top ten (Vaidisova had a career-high ranking of No.7 in May, 2007) but to rise higher and challenge for the major titles."

Since losing his job at the LTA, Felgate worked for a while with Naomi Cavaday, one of Britain's foremost teenage hopes, and was recently asked to spend some time re-focusing Xavier Malisse, the former Wimbledon semi finalist from Belgium, who was worried that he had lost an edge to his competitive desire. Malisse promptly went out to defeat David Nalbandian of Argentina in Key Biscayne, Florida last week en route to the fourth round of the Sony Ericsson Open where he lost to Radek Stepanek of the Czech Republic. Stepanek happens to be engaged to Vaidisova.