“Too much attention disoriented her”: Elena Dementieva explains the pressure behind Mirra Andreeva’s breakthrough season

The 2-time Grand Slam runner-up Elena Dementieva backed Mirra Andreeva to take a step forward next season and push for even bigger goals, offering a detailed assessment of the teenager’s rapid rise and the challenges that came with her breakthrough 2025 campaign. Speaking to Championat and other outlets after the season had concluded, Dementieva placed Andreeva’s results within a broader context of development, maturity, and emotional adaptation to life at the top of the WTA Tour.

The 2025 season proved to be a pivotal one for Andreeva, who captured her first major titles in Dubai and Indian Wells and reached the quarter-finals at Roland Garros and Wimbledon. Those results accelerated her climb up the rankings and positioned her among the most talked-about players on tour, while also increasing expectations both inside and outside her team.

Rather than framing the year as purely successful or problematic, Dementieva emphasised how quickly those achievements arrived. Her analysis suggested that Andreeva’s emotional fluctuations during the season were closely linked to the speed of her ascent, the intensity of media attention, and the growing tendency to compare her with established stars and past legends of the sport.

With the season now officially over and attention shifting toward 2026, Dementieva’s perspective offers a measured framework for evaluating Andreeva’s progress — recognising the significance of her results while acknowledging the internal adjustments still required at this stage of her career.

Dementieva began by underlining Andreeva’s level of maturity on court, despite her young age, pointing to her performances in Dubai and Indian Wells as clear indicators of a player already capable of analysing her own game and managing pressure in high-stakes environments.

“At such a young age, she is already mature enough, she analyses her game and can handle pressure,” Dementieva said. “I still believe that next year could be even better for her. This could be her opportunity to consolidate her place among the top ten and aim for even more significant titles.”

When asked directly about the emotional crises Andreeva experienced during matches throughout the season, Dementieva attributed them primarily to age and to a transitional phase in her professional career, rather than to deeper structural issues that would require urgent intervention. “I think it’s due to her age. You could say this is a transitional stage in her professional career. She needs to get through this,” Dementieva explained. “She needs to learn how to manage her emotions and feelings.”

Dementieva then expanded on the context surrounding those emotional moments, stressing that Andreeva and her team had set clear objectives — and achieved them far more quickly than anticipated. According to her, that rapid success played a central role in destabilising what had initially been a controlled development plan. “They set specific goals with her team and achieved them very quickly. Two consecutive tournament victories, a spectacular rise — not only into the top ten, but into the top five,” Dementieva said. “I think this came as a surprise for them.”

She also highlighted the impact of external pressure, particularly the surge in media coverage and the constant comparisons with former champions that followed Andreeva’s breakthrough. “There was too much media attention, too much discussion, too many comparisons with other great stars, with the legends of this great sport. And of course, that disoriented Mirra,” Dementieva added.

Despite those challenges, Dementieva expressed confidence in Andreeva’s ability to stabilise emotionally over time, citing her intelligence and the quality of her support team as key factors moving forward. “She’s a smart girl, she has a good team. I think they will explain everything to her, explain everything properly, and she will come out fighting,” Dementieva said. “She will stabilise emotionally.”

Dementieva adopted a similarly balanced tone when discussing Aryna Sabalenka, whose 2025 season further confirmed her status among the elite of the WTA Tour. Sabalenka won four titles during the year, including the US Open, and reached five finals overall — notably at the Australian Open, Roland Garros, and the WTA Finals. “She has every chance to win the Calendar Grand Slam,” Dementieva said. “She has shown a lot of confidence this season.”

Rather than focusing on the narrow defeats that prevented Sabalenka from converting all of those finals into titles, Dementieva framed those moments as an integral part of her ongoing development as a top-level competitor. “Yes, there were moments when she stumbled, you could say, right at the finish line,” Dementieva explained. “But she will learn from them, gain more experience, and become stronger.”

A central element of Dementieva’s assessment was Sabalenka’s emotional growth. She suggested that continued experience at the very top could allow the Belarusian to approach decisive moments with greater calm, reducing the impact of stress on her performances. “Perhaps she will feel more relaxed in different situations on the court, less stressed, so that these emotions don’t affect her,” she said.

Dementieva ultimately believes that the confidence Sabalenka built throughout the 2025 season will carry over into the next campaign — a factor she sees as crucial as Sabalenka continues to pursue the sport’s biggest achievements. “Without a doubt, she has gained a lot of confidence this season,” Dementieva concluded. “I think Aryna will start next year with that confidence as well.”