Sakkari Taps Into Power Of Positivity 

Greek Star: ‘I’m Not Playing Tennis To Be No. 65’

By Richard Osborn

The most successful woman in the history of Greek tennis is a confessed foodie.

Whether it’s a Double Double from In-N-Out Burger in the Southern California desert, or a celebrity chef-crafted meal at the overhauled Lindner Family Tennis Center in Mason, Ohio, she’s often at her happiest when there’s some tasty victuals at her disposal.  

But Maria Sakkari’s happiness runs a little deeper these days thanks to some rediscovered perspective. The always-uber-fit player who had notched a tour-best nine Top-10 wins in 2021; who had reached WTA 1000 finals in Indian Wells in 2022 and 2024; who three years ago climbed to a career-high No. 3, was mired in a mid-career malaise. A shoulder injury brought her 2024 season to an end after the US Open. She was in danger of dropping out of the Top 100 as recently as May. Looking for answers, she stopped working with her coach of six years, Tom Hill, only to rehire him earlier this year.

She’s now in a much better place.  

“I think it’s just the fact that I found balance,” said Sakkari on Friday after her opening-round 6-3, 3-6, 6-2 win over Kamilla Rakhimova at the Cincinnati Open. “Going into the season, I was just very stressed, very focused on, ‘I have to get back the Top 10’ and, ‘If I’m not in the Top 10, I’m a failure. It’s not good enough.’ I’m just getting rid of that thought and just giving myself time.”

Back on her favorite surface in Cincinnati, the now-65th-ranked Sakkari is finally seeing the light.

“I feel like I’m getting there with my game. I’m a lot happier than I was before. That’s the most important thing,” she said. “Good things are going to come. I’m very positive about it. It’s the first time that I can look you in the eyes and tell you that for sure. I’m convinced that good things are, for sure, going to come. It’s just going to take time. I don’t know how long, but I’m very happy with how things are going. It wasn’t easy, but I would say, overall, happiness is personally the key right now.”

“I was just, like, ‘You know what? I live a great life. I’m so privileged and so grateful to be in tournaments like this. I’m not going to be playing for another 10 years, that’s for sure, so I better enjoy it now and just trust the process, which I do.”

Sakkari, whose mother, Angeliki Kanellopoulou, was a Top-50 player in the late ‘80s, has been transparent about dealing with nerves, with pressure, with anxiety. In the Netflix docuseries “Break Point”, she confided, “I was struggling because I could see the finish line, but then I couldn’t win the match.” The reference was to her infamous Roland Garros semifinal of 2021 when, a point away from her maiden Grand Slam final, she squandered the opportunity against eventual champion Barbora Krejcikova.

Those voices of doubt? The two-time Cincinnati Open quarterfinalist says they come from within.

“I’m a perfectionist. I’m playing tennis to be a Top-10, Top-5 player,” she asserted. “No disrespect to other players, but I’m not playing tennis to be No. 65 in the world. Otherwise, I will stop and do something else, because I feel I have the capability to do so. I just want to do it full-on and just be one of the best. I’m not happy with being No. 65. I just know who I am, I know what type of athlete I am.”

Sakkari is in for another test in her second-round opponent, seventh seed Jasmine Paolini. She’s 2-1 against the Italian, including a 6-2, 6-1 third-round decision earlier this year at the Mutua Madrid Open.