Danielle Collins refutes link between her impending retirement and form with disrespect called out

Danielle Collins sealed a 6-4, 6-3 win over Victoria Azarenka to set up a semi-final meeting at the 2024 Rome Open against Aryna Sabalenka and again had to clap back at questions surrounding her retirement.

Collins decided at the start of 2024 to retire after the end of the season at the age of only 30 in order to start the next chapter of her life. Whether that is have kids, get married or even start new business ventures, it is very much an open book for the American.

But it has soon led to Collins being able to play with some freedom. Albeit she refuted those claims saying that it is years of hard work and not a blip led by her decision to retire. In the immediate aftermath though of her win over Azarenka, she said that she is going out with a bang and that she wanted to play her best tennis retiring.

"I'm going out with a bang," Collins said. "I want to go out playing my best tennis because I certainly wouldn't want to go out playing my worst tennis. That does happen sometimes, unfortunately. It's important for me to feel like I got everything I could out of myself as an athlete."

"It's super rewarding because you go through periods where you might take three steps forward and four steps back some weeks," Collins said. "It's kind of like the stock market. It's really up and down sometimes.

"So it's been nice to have a stretch when I've just been climbing, because it's not always like that. You have to be really happy for yourself in these moments because it doesn't always work out that way."

But in her post match press conference, she had to bat away questioning about the links between the two with Collins said that she hopes people can respect that her hard work is the reason for her form, not her impending retirement. “I don’t really know what that means, to play freely. I’ve put so much work into this over the years. My success is a product of that and I hope people can respect that,” Collins concluded.

Since getting thumped by Iga Swiatek at Indian Wells, Collins has really starred. She won Miami and then backed it up with Charleston. She was a bit undercooked in Madrid with a break in between. This saw struggles against Olga Danilovic and Jaqueline Cristian. But she still managed to reach the Last 16 losing to Aryna Sabalenka. The same player who she will take on later today in Rome.

Amid all that though has come a lot of questioning surrounding whether she will take a retirement U-turn as well as whether her form is to do with retirement, two ideas that she has batted away. But Collins on the otherhand certainly wants to go out with a bang and is doing just that.