Teenager Bianca Andreescu no longer starstruck

WTA Tour
Bianca Andreescu celebrates

It would be easy for Bianca Andreescu to get starstruck when she comes up against the world’s best players, but the teenager says she is adapting to life at the top.

The 18-year-old wrote her name into tennis folklore last weekend when she became the first wildcard to win the BNP Paribas Open.

En route to her maiden WTA Tour title, she beat Grand Slam winners Garbine Muguruza and Angelique Kerber, as well as WTA Finals champion Elina Svitolina.

However, she no longer feels overawed when she comes up against big-name players.

“Now that I am gaining more and more experience and getting more and more confident playing against these top-level players I am definitely not starstruck anymore,” she said.

“But I want to just go into every match not trying to focus on who’s on the other side (of the net) and just focus on myself.”

For someone who is just starting out her career, it has been an intense year for the Canadian as she also reached the ASB Classic final in Auckland at the start of the year.

Add the drama from the Indian Wells fairytale run and you can see why she wants to spend time away from tennis after this week’s Miami Open.

“I’ve never been in a situation like that before. Never been in a final of a premier event playing a very high-level opponent,” she said.

“So I think it was also all of the emotions and all of the tension that was going through my body that caused me to get even more tired than I usually would.”

She added: “Definitely after Miami I will take a good two or three weeks off just figuring out what to do better with my body and my nutrition and my mind.”

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