ZHUHAI, October 29, 2017

Kristina Mladenovic says she is ready for a final ‘little push’ at next week’s Hengqin Life WTA Elite Trophy Zhuhai at the end of what has been a rollercoaster 2017 season for the Frenchwoman. Her blistering form in the first half of the year included a thrilling run to the quarter-finals at Roland Garros and means that, despite struggling to match those results since, this has been the best year of her career.

Mladenovic is likely to be top seed in the high quality 12-player field when the WTA Elite Trophy Zhuhai gets underway on Tuesday (October 31) after breaking into the world’s Top Ten in the year-end rankings for the first time earlier this week. Mladenovic is looking to build on that success this coming week, knowing that if she recaptures her form in Zhuhai it could provide her with the perfect foundation for 2018.

Kristina Mladenovic in Zhuhai

“Definitely this is a chance to set the tone for 2018. The second half of this season was a real struggle for me but the positive note for me is that I now feel better physically and I managed to sort out the physical problem that I had. I feel kind of refreshed. And I would like to compete better and play better and the results can also come in Zhuhai. Just to feel part of it is also a chance to relax in a way because it’s a great achievement and after a long year you can just give a little push and then afterwards you can absolutely relax, take time off, think with your team what was good and what was not good and start to build for the next season,” said Mladenovic.

“The year was pretty big for me. Many great lessons for me, let’s say. I had a huge six months of the year and then I struggled a little bit and I was unlucky with injury but I always say that things are happening in life for a reason and at least I feel like I have learned so much from this year in every way. To have my best year, to be in Singapore as an alternate first of all made me extremely proud because I know many would love to be there.

“The reward is also to play in Zhuhai and I heard it’s an amazing event from some of the players who came last year. Some of those who competed there last year qualified for Singapore the following year and the other way around, so the field is very strong. It’s a very big event and the WTA and the organisers are putting in lots of effort. I’m actually very excited because to be in one of the year-end events is big goal. I’m looking forward to visiting the area as well because I have never been there and I’m excited to go and compete there with the other girls.”

Singles line-up:
Kristina Mladenovic (FRA)
Coco Vandeweghe (USA)
Sloane Stephens (USA)
Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova (RUS)
Anastasija Sevastova (LAT)
Elena Vesnina (RUS)
Julia Goerges (GER)
Angelique Kerber (GER)
Ashleigh Barty (AUS)
Magdalena Rybarikova (SVK)
Barbora Strycova (CZE)
WC Shuai Peng (CHN)

Doubles line-up:
1 Raluca Olaru (ROM) and Olga Savchuk (UKR)
2 Alicja Rosolska (POL) and Anna Smith (GBR)
3 Shuai Zhang (CHN) and Jing-Jing Lu (CHN)
4 Ying-Ying Duan (HN) and Xinyun Dan (CHN)
WC Zhaoxuan Yang (CHN) and Chen Liang (CHN)
WC Qianhiu Tang (CHN) and Xinyu Jiang (CHN)