ARYNA SABALENKA’S COACH REVEALS WORLD NO. 1’S DEEPEST FEAR: LOSING EVERYTHING
Despite winning the US Open and finishing No. 1, Sabalenka struggles with a deep fear of loss, which her coach is helping her overcome.
Aryna Sabalenka's coach, Jason Stacy, shared that the tennis star fears losing everything.
Stacy, who has been coaching Sabalenka since 2019, is in charge of her mental and physical game.
In 2025, Sabalenka finished the year as the WTA's No. 1-ranked player for the second year in a row, with a great record of 63 wins and 12 losses (84%).
A big moment for Sabalenka that year was winning her second US Open title in September. She also won tournaments in Brisbane, Miami, and Madrid. She came in second at five other events, like the Australian Open, French Open, and WTA Finals.
So far, she has won 21 WTA Tour singles titles out of the 40 finals she's played.
In an interview, Stacy talked about the biggest thing Sabalenka has had to deal with while working with him.
“I noticed early on that she's not very trusting and keeps to herself,” Stacy said.
“It's partly her personality and partly the culture she grew up in. She was raised not to trust anyone or talk about goals because, in her mind, if you talk about something, it'll be taken away. “ If you build something, you’ll lose it.
“This is the mindset she grew up with. Because of that, she still has a big fear of losing everything.
“After Covid, when we went to the US Open, she was really scared that she would not know how to play tennis anymore. She thought she was done.
“It's hard to believe, but it's a real fear she has. She's worked on it, but it's still there.
“The biggest thing was getting her to understand that she needs to open up a little bit to grow and become who she wants to be, even if it’s just a little bit. She needs to be a little more open.
“It wasn't something I could just coach her on, as she does what we say. It was about her facing her deep fears.
MADRID OPEN HIT BY 17 MAJOR WITHDRAWALS, INCLUDING WORLD STARS CARLOS ALCARAZ AND DJOKOVIC
The Madrid Open field is decimated! With 17 players out, including Alcaraz, Djokovic, and Raducanu, see the full list.
The list of players dropping out of the 2026 Madrid Open has jumped to 17, covering both the women’s and men’s singles draws.
By Saturday, 13 players had already withdrawn. The biggest names? Carlos Alcaraz and Novak Djokovic.
Since then, four more women have pulled out, including Grand Slam champs Barbora Krejcikova and Emma Raducanu.
Madrid hosts the first clay-court WTA 1000 of the season and the second ATP Masters 1000 on clay after Monte Carlo. Both tournaments in Madrid have 96-player draws and 32 seeds, who get a first-round bye.
The women’s main draw kicks off Tuesday, and the men’s starts Wednesday. The women’s final is set for Saturday, May 2, and the men wrap things up on Sunday, May 3. Aryna Sabalenka and Casper Ruud won the singles titles last year.
Here’s a closer look at the withdrawals:
ATP Madrid Open withdrawals
Alcaraz, ranked No. 2 in the world and a two-time Madrid champion, misses out again after hurting his wrist in Barcelona. He sat out Madrid last year as well.
World No. 4 Djokovic, who’s won Madrid three times, is out as he recovers from a shoulder injury. The Serb has played only two events this year.
Taylor Fritz, yet to play a clay match in 2026, is the other ATP top-10 player stepping aside.
Here’s the full ATP withdrawal list:
Carlos Alcaraz (world No. 2) – replaced by Sebastian Ofner
Novak Djokovic (world No. 4) – replaced by Adam Walton
Taylor Fritz (world No. 8) – replaced by Roberto Bautista Agut
Holger Rune (world No. 27) – replaced by Francisco Comesana
Sebastian Korda (world No. 43) – replaced by Alexander Shevchenko
Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard (world No. 53) – replaced by Alexandre Muller
Arthur Cazaux (world No. 71) – replaced by Alexander Blockx
Kamil Majchrzak (world No. 73) – replaced by Thiago Agustin Tirante
WTA Madrid Open withdrawals
Reports say Emma Raducanu, the 2021 US Open champ and absent since Indian Wells, is out. Barbora Krejcikova, another major winner, is withdrawing too, alongside Sara Bejlek and McCartney Kessler.
Here’s the current WTA withdrawal list:
Emma Navarro (world No. 27) – replaced by Ashlyn Krueger
Emma Raducanu (world No. 29) – replaced by Ajla Tomljanovic
Maya Joint (world No. 30) – replaced by Moyuka Uchijima.
Sara Bejlek (world No. 34) – replaced by Viktorija Golubic
McCartney Kessler (world No. 48) – replaced by Kamilla Rakhimova
Barbora Krejcikova (world No. 52) – replaced by Zeynep Sonmez
Sonay Kartal (world No. 55) – replaced by Petra Marcinko
Varvara Gracheva (world No. 59) – replaced by Eva Lys
Veronika Kudermetova (world No. 62) – replaced by Taylor Townsend
EMMA RADUCANU DROPS TO NO. 29 AS VIRAL ILLNESS DELAYS COMPETITIVE TENNIS RETURN
Emma Raducanu falls to World No. 29. Discover her Madrid Open comeback plans and the viral illness that halted her WTA season.
Emma Raducanu has slipped further down the WTA rankings as she focuses on regaining her full fitness. At 23, she has faced several interruptions since her breakthrough win at the US Open in 2021.
While Raducanu stands out as a major title winner, having claimed her US Open victory after navigating the qualifiers, she reached her highest ranking at No. 10 less than a year later. Since then, she hasn’t added another singles title to her name, working instead on finding steadiness in her game. She’s aiming to kick off her clay-court season at the Madrid Open later this month. Yet, her ranking has dipped ahead of that event, partly because she withdrew from both the Miami Open and the Linz Open.
Currently listed at No. 29, down one spot from 28, Raducanu hasn’t gained ranking points recently due to recovering from a viral illness. Her last appearance was at Indian Wells in March, where she exited in the third round against Amanda Anisimova.
Her decision to miss Miami and Linz came after falling ill. Reports from BBC Sport noted that she started feeling unwell in February but kept competing until she pulled out of the Austrian tournament.
As Raducanu prepares for a potential comeback at Madrid, which kicks off on April 21, Romania’s Sorana Cirstea has moved ahead in the rankings. At 36, Cirstea climbed three places to 26th after reaching the quarter-finals in Linz.
Interestingly, Raducanu and Cirstea met earlier this year at the Transylvania Open final in Cirstea’s home country. Cirstea won decisively, 6-0, 6-2, though Raducanu admitted she wasn’t at her best even before the match started.
“In Cluj, I picked up a virus at the start of the tournament,” Raducanu shared with the Guardian in February. “I was dealing with that and its after-effects... which lasted for three weeks. I’ve been trying to shake it off. The Middle East trip was really tough for me.”
It seems Raducanu is keen to recover fully before stepping back onto the court. Looking back, Aryna Sabalenka took the 2023 Madrid Open title with a 6-3, 7-6 win over Coco Gauff in the final.
