Rybakina, unequivocal: "My coach never mistreated me"

Streaming Australian Open live tennis

🎾 Hady Habib vs Yunchaokete Bu

* You can watch and bet on this match live here..

Much controversy surrounds Elena Rybakina in the lead-up to this 2025 Australian Open, specifically regarding her coach, Stefano Vukov. A man who left her team after many years and now wants to return, but the WTA is there to stop him. Why? Apparently, he did not behave well with the Kazakh in the past. At her recent Media Day, Rybakina staunchly defended the coach, although she knows that for these two weeks, she will have to settle for the company of Goran Ivanisevic. Not too shabby either.

‘Vukov Case’

“Well, first of all, as is usual with every situation, I do not want to talk about what will happen next, but I can definitely assure you that I do not agree with many things that the WTA is doing regarding my relationship with Stefano. As I have said before, I have never filed any complaints or anything similar against anyone, I have always maintained that he never mistreated me, that's on one hand. Given the current situation, I do not want to talk about it anymore, I prefer to focus on my tournament matches”.

External Noise Before a Grand Slam

“Definitely not the ideal situation. As I have mentioned before, I am not happy with the situation, especially when I still hear some coaches making certain comments, or people who are not directly related to the tennis world. Those people read the comments and cannot understand them, they only manage to make a spectacle out of all this. I don't think it's fair, to be honest, so my goal now is to focus on the matches, that's what I plan to do”.

Goals in 2025

“Above all, I want to stay healthy, as in 2024 I missed many tournaments and could not participate in some important events. Competing from the start to the end of the year has always been very difficult for me, but I want to win big titles, of course, that is my goal on the court. Off the court, I am happy, I recently got my driver's license, so that makes me very happy. What I need to achieve is to be healthier, even when you have free time, you don't want to stay in bed, it is normal to look for something to improve. This is the main focus”.

Past Problems

“It's not easy when you are used to traveling every week, it's not easy to decide not to play, not to push yourself, after all, we are all great competitors. At the end of the day, what one wants is to be better than the day before, that's why last year was so tough for me. Upon returning from Melbourne, sleep problems started, and I have been suffering from this for a long time, so it's not easy. These two months without competing, however, were very useful because I invested them in training a lot, and that helped me”.

Willing to Make Changes

“I need to listen more to my body because no one knows better than me how I feel, not even the members of my team. They can simply see everything from the outside, follow my workouts, but they cannot listen to my body like I do. With already weakened immune system issues, reality forced me to make some tough decisions regarding my schedule, but I reiterate that it is not easy to skip a tournament or an entire tour. Sometimes it's also not easy to follow the rules, but there are times when certain decisions need to be made. Hopefully, I can do better this season”.

This news is an automatic translation. You can read the original news, Rybakina, tajante: “Mi entrenador nunca me maltrató”