Mladenovic hits out at Garcia over split

French Open quarterfinalist Kristina Mladenovic has opened up about her split with former doubles partner Caroline Garcia, describing the situation as ‘very sad’.

In a brutally honest interview with sport360.com, Mladenovic criticised her fellow Frenchwoman for lacking the ’courage or human values’ to speak with her directly about the decision to focus on her singles career.

“What really happened is that she just decided that she wanted to stop playing doubles and she just sent me a poor message over the phone,” Mladenovic explained.

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“I would have understood any reason she would have given me to stop playing together – anything she would’ve told me I would’ve totally agreed and respected. But she didn’t have the courage or human values to come and talk to me face-to-face and say ‘listen Kiki, I have these goals, I see it like this, I want to stop for that reason’ but that didn’t happen.”

Mladenovic and Garcia enjoyed a successful doubles career together, winning the French Open in 2016. The pair also teamed up in the 2016 Fed Cup final, where France were beaten 3-2 by the Czech Republic.

At Roland Garros 2017 the pair have both reached the quarterfinals, signalling a significant resurgence in the quality of French tennis. However, the relationship between the two remains frosty due to the nature of their split.

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“We met in Indian Wells in the ice bath and she was surprised I was actually cold with her. She wanted to know why I was cold and I was like ‘You’re asking me? I know we weren’t necessarily friends outside of the court but at least what we shared and lived through, our beautiful tennis results, you could have at least thought to see me face-to-face and tell me after all we’ve been through. You didn’t do that so I was very disappointed with you and I’m disappointed’.”

Mladenovic will face Timea Bacsinszky in today’s quarterfinal, while Caroline Garcia will take on Karolina Pliskova on Wednesday.