‘She has been No.1 before, she can be again,’ Simona Halep backed by her new coach Patrick Mouratoglou as he focuses on taking her back to the top
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SImona Halep and Patrick Mouratoglou
Patrick Mouratoglou has joined hands with Simona Halep as a full-time coach of the former World No. 1. The Frenchman recently opened up on various aspects in his interview with Tennis Majors. The Frenchman has cleared the air on his stance with Halep and is looking to take the Romanian back to where she belongs.
Mouratoglou has been the long term coach of Serena Williams therefore the Frenchman had to discuss the situation with the 40-year-old before moving on to new things. “I decided to go see Serena to discuss the situation and see what was her own situation and what could be mine,” Mourtaglour said. “If she was still counting on me or not, did she know exactly when she would restart playing, you know, all those things. So I went there to the US only to speak to her, which I did. And after this discussion, I knew that at least short-term I could start working as a coach with somebody else.”
“I went to see Simona was and we had a discussion there. I did tell her that then I was available and then she said she was interested to work with me. So I told her, ‘Let’s go back to the academy and we’ll start something and we’ll see how things are going.’ And things went, I think, extremely well from the first minute. So then the situation was clear,” Mouratoglou added.
Patrick Mouratoglou does not want to set any bar limiting Simona Halep’s growth
Simona Halep started the year with a win in Melbourne in the build-up for the Australian Open. The Romanian reached the fourth round before going down fighting against Alize Cornet. She continued her performances in Dubai as she reached the semifinals in Dubai.
Apart from her outings in Doha and unfortunate miss in Miami Halep was pretty consistent considering this was her returning year on tour. She reached the semifinals of the Indian Wells as she lost to the eventual champion Iga Swiatek.
When asked about their plans for the future Patrick Mouratoglou highlights how he does not want to put any limit to Halep’s growth. He shared how he will be working on her overall game to help her to get back to the top.
“I don’t think we should put any limits. She’s been No 1, she’s won Grand Slams. There is no reason why she couldn’t or she wouldn’t be able to do that again. So there won’t be any limits. The goal is not to say this is what we aim for, because sometimes you go even much further than what you think. The goal is to probably one day stop her career thinking, ‘I’ve done the maximum of what I could have done.’ And I think she has many years to go until she stops, and those many years, we want to make the best out of them. I think she has still such potential to improve in many aspects of her game,” the star coach highlighted.
“The short-term plan is to do everything so she’s the best player possible. I think she has achieved a lot already. She has been No 1, she has won Grand Slams, so she’s part of the very, very, very few players who have been able to achieve incredible things. So she’s a champion, but I also feel that she has a big margin for improvement in many aspects, and she’s still very hungry,” he continued.
Simona Halep is now working with the French at his academy s she prepares for the clay-court season. Halep who is a former French Open will be eyeing a good outing at the French Open.
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