Jessica Pegula and Bianca Andreescu are on opposite ends of recovery timetable
Jessica Pegula has been missing in action on the tennis court for much of 2024. She missed the Middle Eastern hardcourt swing of the WTA Tour in February and is now out of the European red clay court swing of the tour leading up to the French Open. At this point, her participation at the French Open later this month is up in the air.
Pegula's latest injury is an unspecified one that happened in practice after the Billie Jean King Cup qualifying matches. She recently addressed her fans on social media saying she felt good but was working her way back at a snail's pace.
Looks like Jessica Pegula might miss RG as well as Rome. pic.twitter.com/DmIdNwsjTV
— TennisNow (@Tennis_Now) May 6, 2024
In addition to limited singles play, she has rarely played with her doubles partner Coco Gauff. During last year's WTA Finals, Pegula openly spoke about she and Gauff wanted to play a lot early in 2024 to prepare for the Paris Olympics. After that, they would play less, focusing on their singles careers. Her injuries have upended all of these plans so it is unclear how prepared she will be for the Summer Olympics in both singles and doubles with Gauff.
While Jessica Pegula is sidelined, Bianca Andreescu plans a comeback
2019 US Open Bianca Andreescu has not played competitive tennis for nearly nine months. She recently appeared on the Match Point Canada Podcast and dropped plenty of news about her comeback and Olympic aspirations.
🚨NEW EPISODE🚨
— Match Point Canada (@MatchPointCAN) May 6, 2024
2019 US Open champ @Bandreescu_ joins us this week!
She discusses returning from injury, a new coaching team, Olympic aspirations, goals for the year and much more.
Plus, we recap the @MutuaMadridOpen and FAA's run to the final!
🎧🔽https://t.co/yaMi0wiJYu pic.twitter.com/L4Z6oeUTWD
Andreescu will play in Rabat at the WTA250 clay court event beginning May 19. While out of the game, she made changes to her coaching team. Her long-time hitting partner JT Nishimura, 28, is now her coach. Andreescu feels the change is positive because he knows her well, is young, and is receptive to her ideas and input on her training.
Andreescu believes her game is there, but she needs consistent injury-free match play to gain momentum and confidence. Her goal is to make the Top 20 by the end of the year. At 23, she has suffered more than her share of injuries and starts and stops in her career.
She has been open about her Paris Olympics aspirations. Andreescu explained that she wants to use her protective ranking and hopefully will play well in the spring tournaments so that she is able to qualify for the Olympics.
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