Back at the top, tennis player Caroline Garcia has lost her coach
As comfortable as she was in cowboy boots and a cowboy hat as evening wear for an official photo with seven other WTA Masters participants, Caroline Garcia hasn’t let go of her smile since her arrival. in Fort Worth, Texas, where the competition takes place. Now sixth in the WTA rankings, the Frenchwoman enjoys her place among the best players in the world, obtained at the end of a rich season.
But the end of his collaboration with his trainer Bertrand Perret, announced by the interested party on Friday, October 28, may make him wince, as the technician allowed him to regain his best level.
Three titles, US Open semi-final, new doubles title – with Kristina Mladenovic – at Roland-Garros, first WTA 1000 title (the most competitive tournament after the Grand Slam) in five years… Caroline Garcia had her best season since 2017, the year of her first and only participation in the Women’s Masters, where she captured 8e world ranking
A successful season, or rather a summer, because the Frenchwoman shined above all between mid-June and mid-September, with 31 victories in 36 games, and titles obtained in three different surfaces: grass in Bad Homburg (Germany), clay in Warsaw (Poland), and hard court in Cincinnati (USA).
These victories allowed him to leave from 74e on the 6the place around the world this fall. “Returning to the top 10 is the goal, but I don’t consider it so soon”he wondered, in the columns of The teamSeptember 12.
New self-confidence
This renewal, the Lyonnaise has a part in his new sports coaching. His father, who trained him from 2012 to 2021, left the courts at the request of his son, while remaining his manager, and Bertrand Perret, as well as a physiotherapist and physical trainer, Laura Legoupil, joined to Caroline Garcia. This team allowed him to regain confidence in his game, despite a difficult start to the season due to a foot injury.
“At the beginning of the year, when there were no expected results and I saw my ranking drop, there was something at home. [Bertrand Perret] something positive and confident. If I continue to practice like that, with this identity, one day or another, it will bear fruit. He gave me confidence”Caroline Garcia confessed The teamin September.
Under the leadership of Bertrand Perret, former coach of the Chinese Peng Shuai and the Tunisian Ons Jabeur, Caroline Garcia is approaching the best ranking of her career (4e, in September 2018), and returned to the tennis that made him so successful. With a clinical serve, an assumed forward game, catching the ball early after the rebound, and a forehand that allowed him to finish points, the French number 1 was once again dominant on the courts. “Tennis played forward is what I like. This game is more and more clear in my head”, he explained after his loss in the semi-finals at the US Open.
“Problems” that “end up destroying the environment”
But while Caroline Garcia has found a coach who seems to understand the best way for her to work, in a clan where her father is often considered omnipresent, the announcement of the end of the partnership between the player and Bertrand Perret was surprised, especially at the dawn of the Masters. “In recent weeks there have been problems. They ruined the atmosphere and I chose to stop. I do this job for fun and less of them”Perret explained to The teamwithout expanding the nature of the problems. “I’m happy to have taken her to the Masters, for everything we’ve done. I have no problem with Caroline and I’m happy for her.”he added.
Saturday, in a press conference, Caroline Garcia explained that Perret’s departure “A surprise”, but will not go further into the details of this separation. “He decided to leave the team and I respect that decision. I just want to thank Bertrand [Perret] for all the hard work done this year. We started at the bottom and reached the top at the end of the season. » To receive advice from a coach during the Masters, the Frenchwoman chose to call the Argentinian Juan Pablo Guzman, with whom she collaborated for part of the year 2021.
For this Masters, Lyonnaise was drawn in the so-called “Tracy Austin” group, with American Coco Gauff, Russian Daria Kasatkina, and the favorite, Polish world number 1 Iga Swiatek, as opponents. “It’s a good band. Anyway, there are eight best players of the year. You can’t really choose who you’re going to play, but it’s going to be very exciting. For me, it’s three different kinds of matches. I’m going to try do my best”commented Caroline Garcia.
In Fort Worth, she will try to do at least in her first participation, by reaching the semi-finals, before, why not, succeeding Amélie Mauresmo, the only Frenchwoman in history to win the Women’s Masters, in 2005 .
