Playing through back pain in Rome, Elina Svitolina carries on despite feeling limited on court

ROME, Italy—Sitting down after a dominant start to her Internazionali BNL d’Italia campaign, Elina Svitolina looks up at the pair of journalists waiting for her in the mixed zone with wide eyes, looking not a day older than when she first won the first of her back-to-back titles in 2017.

Thoughtful and quick to laugh, she shows no obvious signs of discomfort through 12 minutes of press, but not all is as it seems with the 29-year-old former world No. 3, who confesses she has been dealing with pain practically since she came back from maternity leave last spring.

“I’m struggling on a daily basis,” she admits despite a 6-0, 6-2 demolition of Sara Errani on Pietrangeli court. “Maybe not 10/10 pain but two, three, and sometimes more depending on the matches and the intensity of the training.”

It started with a foot injury, Svitolina recalls, one she picked up in the midst of an inspiring run to the quarterfinals of Roland Garros. The Ukrainian had taken less than a year off to give birth to Skaï, the daughter she shares with beloved ATP pro Gaël Monfils, and she was already on a nine-match winning streak that took her through a first title in almost two years (Strasbourg) and culminated with a Top 10 victory over 2022 semifinalist Daria Kasatkina.

“I feel almost like I'm 17 again coming on the tour fresh,” she said at the time.

That freshness manifested in a more aggressive approach, both a stark contrast to the more counterpunching style on which she relied at the peak of her powers and the result of dedicated pre-comeback practice alongside coach Raemon Sluiter.

Every day is a new day where I can hopefully feel better with exercise and treatment to get stronger. Hopefully, in the future, I’ll get rid of these pains that I have. But for me, it’s difficult not to play or to take a longer time off, and I think for a lot of players it’s like this, where you continue playing. Elina Svitolina

“I always was looking to improve my serve, to improve the power on my shots, to strike the ball cleaner, some technical things on my forehand,” she explained last summer. “Now I had time. I had three months starting from January until my first match where we were just working on my game.”

The work paid off most prominently at Wimbledon, where she stunned world No. 1 Iga Swiatek en route to the semifinals, but Svitolina now reveals she was playing through foot pain that ultimately led her to shut down her season after a third-round exit from the US Open.

“I was in a cast for two months,” she admits on Friday. “I skipped Asia, which was really upsetting for me.”

Though the injury healed over the off-season, she ran into more trouble at the Australian Open when her back went out ahead of a fourth-round encounter with Linda Noskova, who had upset Swiatek one round earlier. With many of the top seeds out in her half of the draw, Svitolina had looked like a favorite to reach her first Grand Slam final.

“Playing again with a lot of intensity, the back went out because I was protecting the foot. It’s all connected in the body, and sometimes it’s like this,” she explains.

“I’m not getting younger, so my body is taking more time to recover these days. It’s a new territory for me because I was quite fit before, and didn’t have so many injuries before the pregnancy. Now, when I came back, I’m struggling more with injuries and my body recovers 20% less well, and this is really frustrating for me! I’m trying to do everything possible but sometimes the body is just not there.”

Rather than take another long break, Svitolina defied advice from her performance team and was back in time for the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships, another tournament she won in her breakout 2017 season.

“It’s difficult to stop and take three months off completely,” she argues. “It may help you physically, but I don’t know if it would help, mentally.”

Svitolina also carries more emotional weight than the average player, competing not only for her growing family but also for the people of Ukraine, for whom she has become the sport’s de facto spokeswoman.

“For me when I step on the court, I just try to think about the fighting spirit that all of us Ukrainians have and how Ukrainians are fighting for their values, for their freedom in Ukraine,” she said back in Paris. “And me, I'm fighting here on my own frontline, you know.”

Though her intent is unequivocally noble, the sacrifice has only yielded middling results: since Melbourne, Svitolina is 4-5 heading into Rome and has only won back-to-back matches once, in her first event back in Dubai.

Most worrying is that the injury has left her unable to employ the higher-octane game that had been a hallmark of her comeback.

For me, the worst is to play on an injury that can get worse and force me to be out for six months. It’s important to evaluate every single day, and see how I can get many 1% better than the day before. Elina Svitolina

“I changed my style a little bit, and unfortunately with the injuries I have, they limit me a little bit,” she says. “I cannot practice as much as I want. I really have to closely listen to my body. I’m doing a lot of scans to see how my body is feeling and whether I’m improving enough. For me, the worst is to play on an injury that can get worse and force me to be out for six months. It’s important to evaluate every single day, and see how I can get many 1% better than the day before.”

Aiding in her decision to play on is Monfils, who returned home after his first-round defeat at the Foro Italico to take care of Skaï while Svitolina soldiers on over Mother’s Day weekend— “We don’t stay with each other at tournaments to support one another anymore!” Svitolina laughs—and the longer tournaments allowing her a day in between her matches.

“My game is quite physical, so I feel like it’s going to benefit me,” she muses ahead of a third-round clash with No. 23 seed Anna Kalinskaya. “Now, with injuries as well, I feel like it helps me. It’s similar to the Grand Slams, and maybe it’s better for players to have more time to recover, get ready, to practice more.”

Though Svitolina is clearly capable of playing through individual matches and is surely hard-pressed to skip tournaments like Roland Garros and Wimbledon, she may consider taking the advice she herself gave only eight months ago: “I would definitely recommend the juniors or players coming back after injury to not rush so much, because it really helped me…Sometimes you need to take step back to take time for yourself, to stay at home, to rest, mentally reset and work again, then go.”