Why did Naomi Osaka choose to change coaches?

Naomi Osaka officially replaced her coach, saying goodbye to Wim Fissette, with whom she had great success, winning two Grand Slams during their tenure together. After splitting with the Belgian, she hired the French tennis coach, sports commentator, and businessman Patrick Mouratoglou.

The French coach with Greek origins founded the Mouratoglou Tennis Academy in 1996 and has since coached many up-and-coming players, including Baghdatis, Pavlyuchenkova, Dimitrov, and most recently, Holger Rune. He gained most of his prominence while he coached Serena Williams from 2012 to 2022.

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Patrick Mouratoglou’s good results came with some controversies. Although it was never confirmed as directly Muratoglu’s fault, Simona Halep, the former number one female player and Grand Slam winner, ingested a contaminated substance during her stay at his academy and was suspended for doping. It took the Romanian player a year and a half to justify herself and prove that it was the fault of one of the academy’s employees.

The reason behind the decision to release Fissette

Fissette is an exceptionally successful coach. He worked with maybe two of the greatest Belgian female players, Justine Henin and Kim Clijsters, and some of the biggest international tennis stars like Angelique Kerber, Victoria Azarenka, and Simona Halep, also.

Osaka started collaborating with the Belgian in 2020. She won two Grand Slams with him: the US Open in 2020 and the Australian Open in 2021. After that, in 2022, there was that crisis due to media conferences, mental health issues, and maternity leave that lasted almost two years.

Naomi finally returned to the court at the beginning of this year, but there were no results. In 2024, she did not advance beyond the second round at all four Grand Slams. Her most considerable success outside of the Grand Slams was reaching the quarterfinals in Doha.

Upset with her performance, she decided to change her coach. Muratoglu had faced a similar challenge in the past. When Serena Williams failed to win any Grand Slam titles in 2011, she hired him to help her through the tough time, and he succeeded immensely. With his guidance, Serena won ten out of the 23 major titles.

Both parties have not yet announced their cooperation. However, they were seen training together in Los Angeles. It was only after the training sessions that the Japanese athlete revealed that she was no longer working with Fissette. It’s likely that the French coach, being a renowned figure, did not work with Osaka on a voluntary basis. It seems that the two have agreed to cooperate, but only they know the details of the arrangement.