Elena Rybakina lost her United Cup semifinal match vs Iga Swiatek yesterday in straight sets in Sydney but still defiantly defends her former coach Stefano Vukov, who was invited back to her team last week to help out new coach Goran Ivanisevic. Rybakina expressed displeasure about the gossip by the tennis media and fans about her association and or romance/relationship with Vukov, who has been placed under provisional suspension by the WTA Tour.
“I can only say and I said it already before that he never mistreated me or it was never anything like that,” the former Wimbledon champion said after being defeated by Iga Swiatek 67 46.
“I’m working with Goran,” she said. “I’m happy the way we work now for the couple of weeks. As I also said, that Stefano is rejoining the team because I know the person for six years, and there is a lot of things we can do outside of the court too.”
Vukov’s surprise return provoked a social media controversy.
“The WTA can confirm that Stefano Vukov is currently under a provisional suspension pending an independent investigation into a potential breach of the WTA Code of Conduct,” a WTA spokesperson said in a statement. “As part of the provisional suspension, Mr. Vukov is not eligible to obtain a WTA credential at this time. While the WTA does not typically comment on active investigations, we believe it is necessary to clarify this matter due to recent public statements that misrepresent the situation. We will not provide further details at this point in time.”
The sideshow has distracted and irritated Rybakina. “Of course I’m not really happy with the situation,” she said. “I’m not happy with the comments which I see, especially from the people who are on the tour. It’s active coaches, commentators. I don’t think that it’s fair. The only thing I can say is, like, he never mistreated me. I have respect to him for everything he did from the very beginning when I was [ranked] 200… You can name me other coaches who had the same success with players who have been 200 and then winning Grand Slam and being in the top.”
The 38 year old Vukov, from Croatia, was an ATP player with a career best ranking of 1122 in 2007. The 25 year old Rybakina, born in Moscow, Russia, has won eight WTA singles titles and achieved a career best ranking of no. 3 in 2023. She is currently ranked 6. Vukov had to get a tattoo of Rybakina’s name after she won Wimbledon in 2022, due to lost bet with her.
Elena Rybakina · Stefano Vukov · Wimbledon · Yonex
