Elina Svitolina believes the progress she made in 2019 will help her achieve her ultimate goal of becoming the first Ukranian woman to win a Grand Slam singles title.
Speaking ahead of the season-opening Brisbane International, the 25-year-old insisted she was ready to take the next step after promising so much over the past five years.
Svitolina has long been touted as a future major champion, but despite reaching a career-high world ranking of three and winning 13 titles on the WTA tour, until 2019 she had never reached the semi-final stage at a Grand Slam.
However, last year she made the semi-finals at both Wimbledon and the US Open and she said this showed she was on the right path.
"Making semi-finals definitely brought me the belief that I could take one step further," she said.
"I had the chance to play on the biggest stages and that gave me lots of confidence at that particular point."
"You have to lose almost every single week, so you have to take lots of positives somehow, and that's, I think, what I learned from the past year, that you have to stay really positive in even bad moments and try to move forward."
"(But) for me it's important to add the small things that can improve my game and that's what I'm looking for."
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