Caroline Garcia, who reached the WTA Finals in Singapore by winning Beijing and Wuhan in back-to-back weeks, has taken a while to reach the upper ranks of the game. But now, the 24-year-old believes in herself and has improved a lot over the past five months.
She is now in the Top 10, and she’s also on an 11-match winning streak.
The Frenchwoman said that a number of people wrote her off, and previously it bothered her.
“Maybe some did. But when you are 17 and people tell you you're going to be No. 1 in the future, and you still, Top 50 when you're 22 or something, you're like, okay, it's not really going a good way,” Garcia said at Wuhan, having been called a potential No. 1 by Andy Murray as a teenager.
“But sometimes people don't understand your choice, but you have to make it. You know what you are doing these kind of choice. Sometimes is difficult choices, but we did it. We know it was good for me. After you never know if it's going to pay off right away, but we did it.
"Sometime is difficult to heard some bad comment about your choice or about your game because it is not going the good way.”
Caroline Garcia is coached by her father, Louis Paul Garcia, and her mother, Marylene. In 2016, she finally cracked the Top 30, but got injured this season and didn’t really get going until May, when she reached the semis in Strasbourg.
The experience has increased her confidence in herself. “I know my parents still believing in me anyway. I had some people in my team, we are very close since long time and a lot of years,” Garcia said. “That is the more important for me. Some people I don't know doesn't believe in me, I don't care any more.”