Of the two prodigies, Andreeva began to fulfill her potential much more quickly. At 16, she made the semifinals at Roland Garros. At 17, she won back-to-back WTA 1000s and reached No. 5 in the rankings. Kostyuk, now 23, has a career-high ranking of 16 after 10 years on tour.
Since the clay season started, though, the Russian and the Ukrainian have been surging at the same time.
Each began the swing by winning a 250 title on dirt—Andreeva in Linz, Kostyuk in Rouen. Andreeva went on to beat Iga Swiatek and make the Stuttgart semis, while Kostyuk upset No. 5 Jessica Pegula in Madrid and has now won 10 matches in a row.
Kostyuk credits her recent success to long-term therapy, aimed at trying to make her less volatile on court. You can see the improvement in her reactions during matches.
“I’ve always wanted to change my overall perspective on tennis,” she said this week. “Because for me it was always very, very emotional, and I would spend just a lot of energy, and everything would matter so much to me. Whether it was wins or losses, it was, you know, very just difficult to live in this constant emotional bombing from the inside.”
