Kostyuk: If I started working on the sports component with a psychologist, I would already have a Grand Slam

The first racket of Ukraine Marta Kostyuk spoke about finding sponsors for training and performances, as well as the psychological pressure during the tennis season.

“The plan is to work and win as much as possible. That is, everything depends on this. Nobody [из спонсоров] will not come to you when there are no results. The world is quite fair and cruel in this regard. At this level, just a beautiful face is not enough, there must be a result.”

“There is always pressure, there is responsibility to myself, my and other people’s expectations. There are times when I am as calm as possible. I can really catch this wave when I treat tennis only as a job and go out on the court to do business. And when I approach it this way, then, of course, there are less emotions and less pressure, but this does not always work out. I’m surrounded by people, different situations, there’s a war going on and I’m not always in a mega-stable state.”

“Even though I’m not very happy with the end of the year, I made it to the third round and beyond in almost all the tournaments where I played, except Beijing. This is very stable for my career, the most stable so far of anything I’ve had. That is, for me the expectations are already higher, you want to go far everywhere. Therefore, I am working to be as much as possible in this life balance, when everything is in its place. It’s not always possible, but I’m confidently moving there.”

“It’s just that when I started working with a psychologist, I immediately understood why I was going there and understood that if I just started working on my sports component with a psychologist, then I might already have a Grand Slam, I think it’s not possible, but exactly. But I don’t know what would happen to all the other parts of life. I didn’t have such a goal.”

“I realized that I needed to take a comprehensive approach to where I want to be and who I want to be. I understood that in order to get to this point, I needed to take steps back. I was ready for the fact that my path would be longer than others, like the supertalents Shventek, Raducan and other girls who have great results at a very young age. I was ready for this and consciously made this choice and am happy with the progress I made. I just move on.”

Kostyuk ended the current season after the WTA 1000 tournament in Wuhan, where she reached the third round. Marta remains the first racket of Ukraine, occupying 18th place in the world ranking.