Just a few days ago, the WTA released a statement confirming the one-year suspension of Elena Rybakina’s ex-coach, Stefano Vukov. It said, “The WTA confirms that the independent investigation into a potential breach of the WTA Code of Conduct by Stefano Vukov has concluded. Following this process, the suspension remains in place.” Thereafter, the chief executive of the WTA Tour, Portia Archer, spilled the beans surrounding some interesting details about that incident. Now, Rybakina’s mother’s plea to Vukov has come under the spotlight and it’s shocking, to say the least. Let’s delve deeper.

As reported by the Athletic, Portia Archer had earlier issued a three-page summary to Stefano Vukov, where she mentioned how he had violated Tour’s code of conduct by ‘ridiculing and abusing‘ Rybakina during coaching. The summary also mentioned Vukov had called the tennis star, “stupid” and “retarded.”

In that report, Archer also wrote that Vukov told Rybakina she would still be in Russia “picking potatoes” without him. The three-page summary specified that Stefano Vukov’s “mental abuse” and his tendency to push Rybakina “beyond her limits” had caused her “physical illness.”

Rybakina pulled out of quite a few tournaments due to her illness last year and these points from Archer perhaps tell us the exact reasons behind her struggles. Archer further claimed, “We need a safe environment for everyone.” She even mentioned that Rybakina’s mother, Ekaterina Rybakina was very much aware of all this. In fact, her mother had even sent an email to Vukov asking him not to make her daughter cry ever again. As a result of that, Vukov refused to coach Rybakina at one of the events.

Rybakina has time and again spoken about the enormous contributions of her parents to her tennis career. Her father, Andrei Rybakin was the one who had introduced her to tennis at the age of just 6. While speaking about her mother’s role, she once said, “She’s the one who helps me a lot.” So, seeing their daughter unhappy with certain things was pretty much hard to digest for her parents. 

Vukov’s coaching style has faced backlash several times in the past. For example, in 2020, WTA released a video where Vukov was heard calling Rybakina “lazy” and then he went on to say, “We’ll edit that one.” He once said, “I think there are buttons you can push. You got to know when to provoke your player. I know very well how to get Elena angry, to get her started. That’s something that has helped me with her, with the success. Sometimes maybe people can say that I’m too much on the on-court coaching, but I know how to wake her up.”

Vukov previously received a fair bit of criticism from the ex-pros because of his behavior with Rybakina. “I don’t know how she deals with the coach,” said the former British pro-Laura Robson.

Even Pam Shriver raised her voice about it. On January 1, when Rybakina re-hired Stefanos Vukov, Shriver said, “It’s time for our entire sport to finally stand up to known abuse and cult-like manipulations of players. This is a very sad situation and my prayers are with ER.” However, despite all this, Rybakina has constantly shown her support to her ex-coach. 

“No one offered any support” – Elena Rybakina feels a bit isolated at the moment

According to various reports, when Elena Rybakina initially parted ways with Stefano Vukov after the 2024 US Open, the Croatian flooded her phone with text messages and more than 100 calls. After that, one of Rybakina’s representatives even confronted Vukov.

But when Rybakina rehired Vukov during the 2025 AO, she said, “I don’t agree with a lot of things what WTA do in the sense of my relationship with Stefano…As I said before, I have never made any complaints or any of these things. I always said that he never mistreated me.”

Recently players like Coco Gauff and Iga Swiatek also spoke about the complexity of the situation surrounding Rybakina and her former coach, Stefanos Vukov.

Gauff said, “From my understanding, I know she doesn’t like the decision. I know WTA also has the right to protect her.” However, she also added, “Overall, I think it’s nice that the WTA is making sure that they’re out there to protect players. I definitely think that that’s important in our sport because a lot of times, if you look, sometimes victims don’t even know they are a victim.” Even Swiatek stressed the fact, that every personal trainer and every coach needs to kind of “accept the code of conduct when they want to be on WTA.”

Elena Rybakina is currently taking part in the Dubai Tennis Championships. After clinching victory in her first match against Japan’s Moyukta Uchijima, she said, “It’s very disappointing the way it’s been handled, just the outcome.” 

The Kazakhstani tennis star, however, looked a bit disappointed with the lack of support from fellow players. “No one offered any support. Honestly don’t need. There are couple players I’m in touch more. But to say that I have very, very close friends on tour, it’s I think not true just because we competing against each other. Everybody’s surrounded by their teams.“

Now, after all this turmoil, the only question that arises in our mind is: Can Elena Ryabakina put on a strong performance in Dubai? What do you think?