Elina Svitolina wants better mental health protection for juniors

Svitolina, former number 3 in the ranking, remembers how hard the weight of expectation, loneliness and long trips was. Not to mention the replay of crushing defeats in her mind when she’s stuck in a remote hotel room.

“I had difficult moments in my career (at) a young age. You travel alone, only with your coach. When you travel so many weeks a year, it can be a big challenge,” Svitolina, a 27-year-old Ukrainian player, told The Associated Press in an interview on Wednesday.

“You’re losing almost every week, so this is mentally very difficult to deal with.” Therefore, he welcomes the idea of ​​psychologists being available to youngsters on the tennis tour.

“I think it’s the right path,” he told the AP in Paris.

Elina Svitolina donned the yellow and blue colors of Ukraine and beat Anastasia Potapova of Russia. (twitter)

“Because traveling from January to November can be very difficult. The expectations of the media, parents and the coach. You’re working too hard and you’re not having the success you want.” Svitolina approached things differently in her youth, and perhaps more resilient. But she said juggling too much, too young, affected her emotional development and her personality.

“Surely something changes in your mental life. You become more of a downhill, you become more of a sad person,” she said. “You become a bit of a lonely person, you miss your friends, you miss your family. You’re in a hotel all the time, packing every few days to move to the other city.” Svitolina made it on the elite women’s tour: she won 16 career titles, she reached the quarterfinals or better in all four major tournaments, including the semifinals at Wimbledon and the US Open. There are players who did not reach the highest level, but have to deal with similar hidden struggles.

“There are a lot of things that people don’t see, they don’t realize, that are happening to the young player and what they are going through,” Svitolina said.

“For me, it took a few years to find a good person that I could share (things) with.” In July last year, Svitolina married French player Gael Monfils, who continues to play on the men’s tour.

Svitolina, who works with a psychologist, was one of the speakers Wednesday at the Global Sports Week conference in Paris. She tackled mental health in sports and called on young players to access psychological support.

“For young people, the transition can be challenging, which is why it is important to have a mental coach,” he told the forum.

“To give them this opportunity, if they need to share their fears, share their concerns. It’s very important.”Young players can feel disoriented early on, he said.

“When you are a junior it is extremely difficult to know what is going to happen to you. You see players win trophies, all smiling and happy, but you don’t know what’s going on behind the scenes,” he said.

“When I was a child, I never heard anyone talk about their difficulties… People took it as a weakness.” Svitolina, who is ranked 27th, is on a break from tennis. She constantly fears for her family in Ukraine, shocked by Russia’s 11-week invasion. The mental strain of the war worried her so much that she stopped playing.

“Sometimes your body can’t handle this pressure,” he said.

“When I’m not mentally fit, my physical condition declines.” Misconceptions about successful athletes need to change, Svitolina said, namely that glory and financial gain provide them with some kind of magical immunity against emotional and mental frailty.

“I feel like people are mixing (things up); like when you have a lot of money you should be happy,” she said.

“For me, a successful person is the one who recovers from difficult moments, difficult losses. I feel like this is the best value you can get. This shows how strong you are.”