Garcia on working with Guzman – ‘Ready to stay on my game’

The Frenchwoman is on the cover of this month’s Tennis Magazine

November 1, 2022, FORT WORTH, TEXAS, UNITED STATES: Caroline Garcia of France attends after winning during her first round-robin match of the 2022 WTA Finals Fort Worth tennis tournament against Coco Gauff of the United States (Zuma/Panoramic)

Carrie Dunn

December 16, 2022

After officially appointing the Argentine Juan Pablo Guzman as her coach following the WTA Finals, Caroline Garcia explained this Friday in her column in Tennis Magazine what she was looking for.

“The objective was really to find someone to accompany me on a daily basis and continue to ensure that I stay on my game, it’s important,” she said. “We’ve had some really good results showing how well it works, and I love playing like this so why not? I couldn’t see myself playing on the circuit for long without this.”

Guzman will not accompany the Frenchwoman to every tournament this season, however, unlike her physio Laura Legoupil.

Garcia: Breakthrough was against Sasnovich in Bad Homburg

Garcia briefly reflected on the departure of her former coach, Bertrand Perret, who accompanied her until a few days before the start of the WTA Finals in Fort Worth. “I didn’t expect it, but that’s how it is, anything can happen.”

In this interview, Garcia recalls the moment when everything changed for her in 2022. “Bad Homburg on grass, there was really a ‘switch’ in my attitude in the first round (a 2-6, 6-3, 6-4 win over Aliaksandra Sasnovich), I decided to fully assume my game, to go straight into this style of playing forward, take advantage that it was grass court to impose myself like that, and with the extra attitude. I was more combative and determined.”

Garcia ultimately won this tournament by winning consecutively against Sasnovich, Rakhimova, Lisicki, Cornet and Andreescu, the first of her four trophies this season.

The French No 1 will start her 2023 season as the leader of the French team at the United Cup. Before that, she will play an exhibition tournament in Dubai, the World Tennis League, between December 19 and 24.