Every day, Elina Svitolina wakes up and reaches for her phone, scanning messages from friends and family at home in Ukraine, reading the latest news and watching clips about her country’s fight to defend itself against Russia’s continued war. It is bleak but the 29-year-old wants to do it. It is now as much a part of her as being a professional tennis player or a mother. And she is handling it. As her coach, Raemon Sluiter, said on Saturday: “I don’t want to use the F-word, but she’s … tough.”
“If it’s really horrible – some days are really bad – I know it straight away, as soon as I wake up,” says Svitolina. “This is part of my day. I cannot escape that and I don’t really want to escape because I want to know, I want to be in the loop with what is happening back at home.
