China’s Wang Xinyu was a top junior in 2018, ranked No.2 in the world and vying for the biggest titles on the girls’ circuit. A powerful ball striker with easy power, balanced strokes and plus movement, Wang had all the tools to make her way up the WTA rankings.
But tennis—like life—can be complicated.
It has taken a while, but Wang’s tenth Grand Slam main draw appearance has yielded a Grand Slam party worth waiting for.
Here in New York—a city that she adores—the soft-spoken 21-year-old has reached the Round of 16 at a major for the first time, and joined her compatriot Zheng Qinwen as one-half of the first Chinese duo to ever reach the Round of 16 of the same US Open women’s singles draw.
For a player who entered the season with a 1-6 record in main draw play at the majors, it is a colossal step, and one that demonstrates Wang’s potential to be a top player on tour.
Transitioning from the juniors has proven to be a complicated process for the Shenzhen native, but in 2023, Wang has taken ownership of her tennis and risen to new heights as a result.
On Friday, after her 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 win over Slovakia’s Anna Karolina Schmiedlova in the Grandstand, Wang talked about a recent game-changing realization. Last year she worked with Thomas Högstedt, the widely heralded former coach of Li Na and Maria Sharapova, but eventually came to the conclusion that things weren’t clicking.
She opened up about that decision and the process that led to her taking more ownership of her tennis in an intimate press conference.
“Last year has really been challenging for me,” she said. “It’s been a long year, and I found out in the end, what coaches are telling you sometimes is not 100 percent right.
“You need to listen to how you feel, because if he is telling you, ‘Okay you need to string your racquet 10 pounds tighter,’ or he is telling you, ‘Your racquet balance is not right,’ and then he wants [you] to change, of course as a young player with not so much experience, you follow.”
Going along with the proposed program and racquet specifications, Wang says she started to feel pain in her body, and wondered if she was making the right decisions.
“You try to follow, because he says, ‘If you want me to coach you, you need to believe me.’” she said. “Then my body started to hurt because I’m playing with a racquet that was heavy like stone. Then everything started to hurt and I started to think, ‘Am I doing something wrong?’ Everything becomes emotional and you think it’s your fault, but actually it’s not.”
The Shenzhen native has since switched coaches and is now working with Miro Hrvatin, a former ATP player from Croatia who has formerly coached Miomir Kecmanovic and Bernarda Pera.
She wanted to open up about her experience in order to help other players that may have a similar scenario.
“I’m sharing this because I want more players like me who are coming from the juniors to know that what you feel is the most important thing—not what others are telling you,” she said.
In addition to her success at the Slams this year, Wang has played better than ever on tour as well. She has won 12 of her last 13 matches across all levels and plays the US Open at a career-high ranking of 53.
No matter what happens when she faces No. 10 Karolina Muchova in the Round of 16 on Sunday in Flushing Meadows, Wang is headed for a Top-50 debut on the Monday after the US Open—and could go much higher.
Having the courage to stand up for herself has helped her speed up her evolution as a player, and Wang is now more confident in her own decisions.
A reporter wanted to know if Wang came to her realizations with the help of a mentor, or on her own.
“I think it has to be yourself,” she said. “You have to realize, because when you are going through this, even if somebody is by your side telling you, ‘Okay, what they are telling you is not right,’ you need to think—if you don’t realize, then you just keep doing the same thing.”
An added bonus is that Wang now has the courage to ask more questions, and because of it, she also has more trust in her current team when it comes to important issues.
“Now I am able to tell when is the time that I stand up and say how I feel [and] I think that’s always the most important thing,” she said. “I have good coaches helping me now. I’m really happy I got the good people around me now. Their ideas and what they are telling me is very good.
“I think this year I can be more focused on just tennis. No more of those other things around me. It feels more relaxed, with more matches coming and being more familiar facing high-level players.”
