Aryna Sabalenka is ready to improve and work hard as she looks to defend her Australian Open title.
The world number two is preparing for her first Grand Slam title defence after a magical fortnight in Melbourne last year.
Sabalenka claimed the title by defeating Elena Rybakina in a hard-fought three set victory.
Roll on 12 months later and Sabalenka enters this year’s Australian Open having lost to the Kazakh in the Brisbane final.
Speaking ahead of her title defence Sabalenka had positive things to say about Rybakina and is ready to work hard ahead of this year’s tournament, “Elena just played incredible tennis. She just crushed it. I tried to do my best, and I’m just thankful for those three games,” Sabalenka explained.
“Before the finals, I think I played really great tennis. Everything worked on the pre-season. Everything worked on match. That’s what we are happy with. Even though the finals didn’t go well, we still have another week.
“Now it’s two more days to go. After the finals, was another week to work on those mistakes and just, yeah, prepare myself as good as I can for Melbourne.
“Honestly, that’s what I’ve been doing my whole life. When I am not working, like, on the days off, I’m just sitting in the room or in the house doing nothing, for me, this is impossible.
“For me, staying at home, it’s super boring. It’s something impossible to do. I find working hard is actually a lot of fun. I enjoy it. For me, that’s not really tough to keep working hard, keep improving myself. I’ve been doing it my whole life.”
Sabalenka is looking to keep improving as she continues to show that she has the potential to win more Grand Slam titles.
The world number two also spoke about opening about the work she does off the court as she is one of the main stars of the Netflix documentary series Break Point.
The defending champion spoke about why she decided to show the ups and downs of being an elite athlete, “It was a great time for Netflix to join my team and film it and show people that we are also struggling a lot, that there is not only amazing moments, and we are not only having fun, there is something we are working on and we are struggling with. It’s always up and downs,” Sabalenka explained.
“I’m (an) open person. For me, it’s not that hard to speak about my life and just tell my story. For me, was important to share my story with the people. I hope that people feel closer to me right now and they understand myself better.”
Now Sabalenka’s focus will turn to her Australian Open title defence instead of the Netflix cameras as she takes on German qualifier Ella Seidel.
Speaking ahead of her Melbourne comeback Sabalenka said she was happy to be back, “I’m super happy to be back. Really, I just can’t wait to play my first match here in Melbourne.”
The match will take place on Sunday night, after Novak Djokovic’s opening round match.
