The emotional letter from Svitolina to her daughter talking about Monfils: "It goes far beyond tennis"

Elina Svitolina and Gael Monfils form one of the most iconic couples in the recent history of tennis. They have maintained great discretion for years, but without hiding the immense love they feel for each other. Before the Frenchman says goodbye to the US Open 2026, the Ukrainian tennis player honored his legacy with a letter in The Player’s Tribune that has gone viral.

And rightly so. The text is not only a review of their shared history but also a declaration of love for tennis and an explanation of everything that lies behind Gael Monfils' media personality that has captivated the world. Elina Svitolina points out several aspects worth reviewing before reading the entire letter, which is addressed to their daughter Skaï.

Svitolina begins by talking about the tennis player she knew from a distance when she was a young player in Ukraine. For her, Monfils has always been a different player, able to turn tennis into a spectacle thanks to his creativity, speed, coordination, and intelligence.

"With your father, it’s very simple. You can teach someone just one point, even just one stroke, and he will understand it," she writes. And she explains why: "he could make people feel something", a capacity that, in her opinion, few athletes have had.

From tennis to a love story

The letter also reconstructs the beginning of their relationship. Svitolina and Monfils met in 2017 in New York, although they barely exchanged a few words. A year later, after winning the WTA Finals in Singapore, they coincided in Paris and began to get to know each other.

What was initially going to be just a simple coffee ended up taking up almost the entire day. "We had a lot in common, like two people living a completely crazy life in tennis," recalls Svitolina. Shortly after, there would be that peculiar first date where Monfils showed up with a deck of cards and performed a magic trick to guess her card. "A few weeks later, we were basically living together," she recounts. Three years later, they got married.

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Since then, Svitolina claims to have discovered a very different version of the person the public sees on the court. "People who only see your father on the court may see him simply as someone who entertains," she explains. However, off the court, she defines him as "a pretty complex person", reflective and much quieter than his public image might suggest.

A fundamental partner in the most difficult moments

One of the most personal passages of the letter comes when Svitolina recalls the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which occurred during the early stages of her pregnancy. Her family was in the country, and the situation was especially distressing.

"There is support and then there is support," she affirms. In her case, Monfils did not only accompany her emotionally: "He not only supported me, but he was truly my partner in this." And she adds a particularly significant phrase: "He made me feel that I was not alone. He made me feel that we were a team".

Svitolina also recalls the difficulties Monfils faced during his childhood as a black man in France and in a sport like tennis. She recounts that even as a child, he encountered clubs that prevented him from accessing due to the color of his skin. For her, those experiences help explain the personality and human perspective of the Frenchman.

A career that deserves to be celebrated

The Ukrainian devotes a good part of the letter to also championing the athlete. She remembers his 21 consecutive years winning at least one match in Grand Slam, his 13 ATP titles, his number 6 as best ranking, his four Olympic participations, his 14 Davis Cup selections, and his 19 seasons reaching at least one ATP final.

But for Svitolina, reducing Monfils's career to the titles won would be profoundly unfair. For years, she recalls, many voices tried to convince him that he needed to change his style to achieve the success that was expected of him.

"They told him he had to play one way or another, change his game or seem more serious," he explains. And here emerges the central message of the entire letter: "Life is not simply about adding up our results."

For Svitolina, the truly important thing has been the way Monfils walked his path: the experiences he lived through, the relationships he built, the emotions he stirred, and his ability to stay true to his identity.

"He always remained true to his own path, his own style, his own identity," she writes. And she concludes with a statement that perfectly summarizes what Monfils has meant to her and to tennis: "There was no one like Gael Monfils."

This is the entire letter from Svitolina to Monfils in The Player’s Tribune

Dear Skaï:

In a few days, something very special is going to happen right here in Paris. You are only three years old, so you are still too young to understand what it means :) But I am writing this letter in the hope that one day you will read what your mother thought and then understand. You will understand why your father means so much to so many people around the world. You will understand why his career has been so extraordinary... and why his last Roland Garros is such a beautiful moment.

You will understand that sometimes, tennis is much more than tennis.

But I will start by talking to you about tennis itself, because when it comes to your father and this topic, there is so much to tell. The first thing you should know, I think, is that Gaël Monfils has been one of the players with the greatest ability to create spectacular shots that this sport has ever seen. There have been others who were more consistent or made fewer mistakes... but it's curious. When you explain why those players are great, you might need to give a long explanation, show many statistics, an entire match, or a complete tournament. But with your father, it’s not like that. With your father, it’s very simple. You can show someone just one of his points, even a single shot, and they will understand. Because your father, with one single shot, in one single moment, could achieve something that I think very few athletes have managed: to make people feel something.

It was almost like being at a concert and hearing a perfect song, or being at the movies and hearing a perfect line, and feeling: "Oh my God. WOW!". It leaves you breathless. I wouldn’t say that sports are usually like that. It’s competition, you know. But when you watch Gaël play, there are moments when you connect with something deeper than the sport. Moments when you think: "Okay, tennis isn’t just about one player trying to wear down the other until they destroy them." In his best moments, there’s also magic.

And your father was the best magician.

His creativity, his speed, his intelligence, his coordination... and, let’s be honest, his beautiful smile :) With Gaël, you get the feeling that he is putting on a magic show just for you. And I know this not just from his tennis, but also from our first date. Haha! Let me tell you the story.

When I was a young player in Ukraine, I knew who Gaël Monfils was simply because I saw him on television. Also, in the store of our tennis center, there were many rackets for sale, and one of them was a Prince model with his photograph on the cardboard cover. If at that time someone had told me that I would end up marrying "the guy from the Prince cardboard racket"... I think I would have first said, "That racket is too heavy!" And second, "I don't believe it."

For years, that was mainly it for me. Then I turned professional and hired a coach who was French, like Gaël. That’s how we met: in 2017, in New York, on a practice court in Central Park, thanks to a mutual friend. But I was very shy, so we simply said hello.

A year later, I was 24 years old and won the WTA Finals in Singapore. After winning, I went to Paris to celebrate and posted something on Instagram. One day I'll explain to you what Instagram is. Your father saw my post and wrote to me saying he was also in Paris and asked if we wanted to meet up while each of us was hanging out with our friends.

We met, but throughout the night, he barely spoke to me. To be fair, he was sober. I was... celebrating. Haha! But at the end of the night, when I was leaving the bar, he walked me to the taxi and asked if I wanted to have a coffee with him the next day.

I said, "Sure!"

It's hard to know if that coffee was officially a date. Men can be quite ambiguous about these things. But I think part of the beauty was precisely that it was something "unofficial." We had so much in common, like two people living absolutely crazy lives in tennis, and I felt good talking to him sincerely about that life.

I remember that I even talked about wanting to have children... That's not exactly a typical topic for a first date! I told him, "I'll probably play until I'm 28 or 29, then I'll take a break and have a baby, and then I'll come back to play." I think you can learn a lot about a person by the way they listen, and your father was a very kind listener at that moment. I felt I could tell him anything.

What was supposed to be a quick coffee turned into an entire day. Just the two of us, walking around Paris and getting to know each other. Okay, maybe it was a date after all.

And then, before we said goodbye, I finally met Gaël, the magician.

Speaking solely as your mother... I wouldn't say it's always a good sign when a guy brings a deck of cards to a date. So keep that in mind for the future.

But your father was charming. He gave me a big smile, pulled out his deck, and said, "Alright, Elina. Now I will show you a magic trick. What do you give me if I guess your card?".

I replied, "Uhhh... I don't know... a hug."

Then I got embarrassed by my answer and changed it to: "A kiss on the cheek."

Of course, as soon as I said that, Gaël performed an incredible trick and guessed the card. So I gave him a little kiss on the cheek... and the date ended.

I think a few weeks later we were practically living together.

Three years later, we got married.

And now almost five more years have passed. It’s crazy to think about it. We have lived through so many things together as a couple. And since you were born, as a trio. I feel very lucky to share this adventure with your father.

It hasn't always been easy. In fact, sometimes it has been quite difficult. But I think that’s what marriage and being a couple are about. It's a great lesson I've learned and also a great lesson for you: being someone’s partner can be fun, but it also requires a lot of work. That’s why it’s important to choose someone who is comfortable with both.

And for me, that person is Gaël.

I think many people who only see your father on stage perceive him simply as a performer who entertains. A charismatic showman, with a colorful personality, you know. But off stage, I would say he is very different.

He is quite a complex person. He has a very strong and reflective mind, and I always feel like he is thinking deeply about many things. In fact, he tends to be quieter than noisy.

And it's as if all the creativity he put into his tennis during his career is now being put into our family life. Whether it's playing with you during the day, reading to you before bed, or taking courses he can use in his next professional career, I believe he is always doing little things to care for and comfort our trio.

Sometimes, the support I have needed has not been precisely small.

Just a few months after our wedding, when I was in the early stages of my pregnancy with you, the large-scale invasion of Ukraine began. Not only is it my home country, but my family was there at that time.

It's difficult to even explain how terrifying it was to try to process what was happening and to locate your grandparents to get them to safety.

But let me tell you one thing: it's in moments like this when you truly discover if someone is by your side. Because there is support of the kind "Oh, honey, I'm here for you"... and then there is real support.

With your father, it's like this. He doesn't get involved halfway. He doesn't just stand by my side; he truly becomes my partner in all of this. As if it were his own country suffering a tragedy and as if it were his own parents who were in danger.

Tennis players, let's be honest, we are good at being alone. But if there is one beautiful thing I can remember from that terrible time, it is how Gaël managed to make me feel exactly the opposite of being alone. He made me feel like I was part of a team.

Unfortunately, I believe one of the reasons your father has such a strong character and such a humane perspective is that he has lived through many things throughout his life, especially as a Black man in France and within a sport like tennis.

It was one of the first conversations we had when we started dating. He told me that when he was a child and participated in tournaments under ten years old, there were clubs that did not allow him entry because of the color of his skin.

It broke my heart and made me very angry. But it also made me admire even more the path he has traveled.

Honestly, Skaï, I hope that when you read this, it seems impossible for you to believe that something like this could have ever happened. But I think it still exists in the world, even if it takes different forms. I have seen it myself in some of the reactions towards your father and towards me as an interracial couple.

I am always amazed at the way he handles these things. He does it with enormous elegance.

And when I think about the experiences you will have as a mixed-race girl and, later, as a mixed-race woman, I know how grateful I am that Gaël is your father. There is no one I trust more to help you navigate the world.

And now, of course, I have to go back to tennis.

Sometimes, with your father, it happens that he is such a beloved person and has so many qualities that it is worth celebrating that it is possible to forget to talk enough about TENNIS.

And to say that his tennis, on its own, deserves to be celebrated would be an understatement.

What a player.

As I have said, statistics cannot reflect all of his unique greatness, but let me give you some: 21 consecutive years winning at least one individual match in a Grand Slam. The French player with the most individual match wins in Grand Slam history. 14 call-ups with France in the Davis Cup, with a record of 12-3 and two finals played.

He represented France in four Olympic Games, including Paris 2024, something I know meant a lot to Gaël.

For 19 consecutive years, he reached at least one ATP final, something only five players have achieved in history. He won 13 ATP titles. He was named ATP's Newcomer of the Year at 19 years old. He reached world number 6, the best ranking of his career, at 30 years old. And he won an ATP title at 38, becoming the oldest player to win one in the history of the tour at that time, although he hates being called old. Ha ha!

And he has an extraordinary story at Roland Garros. He won the junior title in 2004. Then he reached the semifinals in that memorable edition of 2008. And now, so many years later, he faces his last main draw tied with the record for the most matches won at Roland Garros by a French tennis player.

It's extraordinary.

But, of all that I hope you will one day understand about your father's career, I want to end with what I consider the most important.

And it has to do with something that happened throughout much of his professional journey: many people tried to change him to fit their idea of what he "should" be.

They said that Gaël had to play a certain way, or another, that he had to modify his game in a specific way or that he should appear more serious. And that, if he did all that, perhaps he could win a Grand Slam.

In tennis, there is a lot of talk about winning Grand Slams. Everything revolves around achieving those results. And this was especially true in your father's generation, with players like Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic, who seemed like machines. Grand Slam after Grand Slam, they were champions.

And, of course, many people in France always wanted one of the French tennis players of that generation to be a champion. When that didn't happen, I think the feeling arose that criticism was needed, because there must have been some reason.

So they started talking about your father's results in a certain way.

But the truth is that there was so much about your father that those people did not know.

They did not know his incredible dedication, that 1,000% he gave day and night, nor the sacrifices he made to get to where he got. They didn't realize how seriously he took the responsibility of representing his country or how much he wanted to do well for France.

And I think the most important thing they didn't know... is almost like a secret that your father discovered.

Very few people know this secret.

But your father taught it to me, so now I will tell it to you.

The secret is this: life is not simply about adding up our results. Life is much more than that.

It's about who we are and who we become while striving to achieve those results.

It's about the experiences we can live, the relationships we can build, the emotions we can awaken and share.

It's about staying true to ourselves.

Does what I'm saying make sense?

Because when I think of your father and his career, more than anything else, I think of that.

About how he always, always, always stayed true.

True to his own path. To his own style. To his own identity. To his own beliefs. To his joy for the game. To his respect for the game. To his love for the game. And even, simply, to the game itself.

And I hope that when people talk about the impact he had on this sport, everywhere and especially here, at Roland Garros, that is what they will say.

I hope they say:

"Gaël Monfils, there was no one like him."

Gaël Monfils meant so much for tennis, but he also meant something much deeper than tennis.

Gaël Monfils stayed true to himself.

This is an automatic translation. You can read the original news, La emotiva carta de Svitolina a su hija hablando de Monfils: "Va mucho más allá del tenis"