Sabalenka: "If someone won everything all the time, it wouldn't be entertaining to watch"

Andrés Tomás Rico | 22 May 2026 | 09.00

Sabalenka: "If someone won everything all the time, it wouldn't be entertaining to watch." Photo: Getty Images

Streaming ATP Hamburg live tennis

🎾 Alex De Minaur vs Tommy Paul

Sign up with Bet365 here
Make your first deposit of at least €5
Go to the “Live” section and watch every match

Watch the match on Bet365

Aryna Sabalenka is already a star, not just in tennis, but also in sports. Thanks to her attitude and personality, the Belarusian is more well-known than other peers on the circuit. While she is indeed the number one in the world, her character, intensity, and joy have turned her into an icon.

Before arriving at Roland Garros, where she will have to defend last year's final, she did an interview for the fashion brand Vogue, where she shared reflections about defeat, her on-court behaviors, and the reasons that led her to pick up a tennis racket.

Aryna Sabalenka opens up in a deep interview before Roland Garros 2026

The first thing Sabalenka does is recall her last defeat. The interview took place ahead of WTA Rome, days after losing to Hailey Baptiste at the Mutua Madrid Open, where she had six match points: "The night I lost, I dreamed about all those match points. I would dream about one point, then wake up and think about that missed opportunity."

However, the Minsk native took the opportunity to explain the mindset with which she faces defeats: "It's a learning process. If I didn't care and just thought: 'Whatever, onto the next one,' I wouldn't learn. That would be detrimental. That's the tough part of being an athlete: you can't always win. At some point, your body will stop you, hold you back. But that's also the beauty of sports. It's nice, too when a young and promising player beats the number one in the world. If someone won everything, it wouldn't be particularly entertaining to watch."

Her father, the one who sparked her interest in tennis

After this analysis, Sabalenka opened up about her beginnings in Belarus and her initial steps with a tennis racket: "In our region, the two most popular sports are ice hockey and tennis, and my father chose tennis. Until I was about 13, we were well-off, and then my father faced difficulties. Many setbacks. I saw him struggle many times in his career, but he always got back up. My parents worked hard to keep everything going, and we didn't talk much about it. But I knew. Parents think we don't know, but we do."

Aryna picked up her accreditation and Ash’s 🐾#RolandGarros pic.twitter.com/a1KytzTInr
— Roland-Garros (@rolandgarros) May 18, 2026

Her father played a crucial role in her beginnings. Far from being an authoritarian figure, he always wanted his daughter to have fun above all else: "Tennis was fun, and I think it's very important for coaches to keep it fun. He always said, 'If you don't like it, if you want to quit, just tell us. You don't have to force yourself to do anything.' There was a time when I was about nine years old when I was about to give up. But I saw how proud my father was of me, and I didn't want to disappoint him. So, I fell in love with the sport again, even more than before."

Explaining her on-court behaviors

In the final part of the interview, Sabalenka criticized some of her attitudes in her early years as a tennis player but also justified the aggressive and intense demeanor she often displays on court: "You have to accept that you've made mistakes. And I've made a lot of mistakes. When I was young, I would get very excited and then get mad at myself for getting excited. Now I understand that it's okay to throw the racket. It's okay to shout. It's okay to lose your temper if you feel like you're holding back too much. Sometimes you just need to let off steam, empty yourself to be ready to start fresh and play the match. Yes, sometimes it looks ugly and terrible, but I need it to stay focused," concludes Aryna Sabalenka, who has no qualms about admitting her faults and showing herself as she is. And perhaps, that is one of the reasons for her success.

This news is an automatic translation. You can read the original news, Sabalenka: "Si alguien lo ganara siempre todo, no sería entretenido de ver"