By Shrivathsa Sridhar
PARIS (Reuters) – Stefanos Tsitsipas said being in a relationship with a fellow professional tennis player was a breath of fresh air with the Greek world number nine and his Spanish partner Paula Badosa arriving at the French Open having rekindled their romance.
Badosa and Tsitsipas first made their relationship official on social media last year at Roland Garros and were often seen at each other’s matches in the rest of the season, while also posting pictures on their joint Instagram account.
Having split earlier this year, the duo got back together ahead of the Paris major and Tsitsipas said on Wednesday after his 6-3 6-2 6-7(2) 6-4 second-round win over Daniel Altmaier that having a partner to talk tennis with was always helpful.
“We both share the same passion and we both do the same thing in life,” Tsitsipas, who will play mixed doubles with Badosa at this year’s tournament, told reporters.
“So to have a person by your side that you love and can comfortably and mutually and reciprocally talk about tennis in our case, I think it’s a breath of fresh air.
“In my case, that person knows a lot about tennis and analyses the game pretty well.”
Former runner-up Tsitsipas has been in good form in the build-up to the year’s second Grand Slam, winning the Monte Carlo title and reaching the Barcelona final.
Badosa, a former world number two, has endured patchy results while dealing with injuries but battled into the second round knocking out 26th seed Katie Boulter.
The pair have been discussing strategy in Paris.
“We talk a lot about tennis. Our primary goal is to help each other figure certain things out. We have a lot of questions for each other,” Tsitsipas added.
“I feel we’re equally as knowledgeable in our craft and hold a lot of understanding of how certain situations should be dealt with. That’s because of the experience we have accumulated.
“We talk about equipment. We talk about things that we can improve. Paula keeps saying all the time, and it annoys me, that she wishes she had my forehand. I tell her ‘I’m sorry, but that’s not possible, so you have to find ways around it’.
“Sometimes I think ‘oh gosh, I wish I had her returns’. She destroys the ball on the returns and it seems so effortless from her side. We try and learn from these things and obviously share a vision of how we proceed with certain things in our sport.”
(Reporting by Shrivathsa Sridhar in Paris; Editing by Christian Radnedge)
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