Paula Badosa, the former World No. 2, is facing a challenging comeback after a back injury sidelined her in May 2023. Badosa’s struggles extend into 2024, with multiple retirements and withdrawals from tournaments like the Abu Dhabi Open and BNP Paribas Open. These inconsistencies have caused her ranking to plummet to No. 73 in the WTA rankings.
Adding to the pressure, Badosa recently opened up about the mental toll of professional tennis. On the Tennis Channel’s “Inside-In Podcast,” she described the constant scrutiny faced by players as “a bit tough.” This vulnerability highlights the unseen mental battles waged by athletes alongside their physical ones.
Can Badosa overcome her injuries and the mental strain? Only time will tell, but her determination to return to form is undeniable.
“I think especially tennis players, we’re constantly judged every match, even every shot, every point, they’re judging us from the outside. I totally understand it. But for us sometimes it’s a little bit tough. But yeah, I feel that of course we’re judged every tournament,” Paula Badosa said. [at 14:28]
“In that moment, no! I was feeling so much pressure and it was so stressful for me. But now that 2 years past, I value that a lot. And now after my injury, I had a lot of time to think about it and of course, I said, ‘Oh, I’ve been pretty good you know’, because you don’t realize that in that moment you don’t value it,” she said.
