Kim Clijsters suggests if she would like to go into coaching after receiving ‘tempting’ offers

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Kim Clijsters knows what it takes to reach the summit of the WTA Tour and could provide guidance to other players now that she has retired.

Clijsters won four Grand Slam titles in her career, and was also world number one for 20 weeks.

The Belgian had a few different coaches while playing, perhaps the most notable being Wim Fissette, who now works with Iga Swiatek, and was on Clijsters’ team for three of her four major victories.

Now, having officially retired for three years, Clijsters has been asked if she would consider giving coaching a go herself.

Kim Clijsters responds when asked if she would consider coaching

Clijsters comments on current tennis players for her media duties, and was speaking on a podcast for Russian outlet Tennis Bolshoi when asked if she would go into coaching.

In her response, Clijsters revealed that she had been tempted before after receiving offers from players, but suggested that she is not yet ready to do so.

“I’ve thought about it several times, and there have been interesting suggestions from players, but travelling is too much for me,” said Clijsters. “Also, I believe that to be a good coach you need to spend 15-20 weeks a year with a player.

“So, I don’t want to be a coach who is just available on the phone. I believe that personal contact, communication, and understanding of the player are necessary to be able to kind of read their mind and see. Yeah, I think it’s been made a little bit easier because of all of this technology, but I still believe that a coach should be there and should see how the player lives not only on the court, but also off the court as well.

“But yeah it’s been very tempting, especially if I work with a player that I have a connection with and feel I can help a little bit, but my youngest isn’t even nine yet so I still want to stay home for now.”

Kim Clijsters suggests the reason why she retired at just 23 years old

Clijsters ended her career with four Grand Slam titles, but that was not the case when she shockingly announced her retirement at 23 years old, with just one major to her name.

One of the reasons why Clijsters ended her career so young was to start a family, but she has also suggested that being a professional tennis player did not live up to the expectations she had growing up.

“When I was on tour in my early years it was such an adventure and I just loved travelling, and I loved going to these different countries and I was just so innocent,” explained the 42-year-old.

“And then I feel like as you get older, I felt very early on that everything outside of tennis was not what I signed up for when I was younger, when I had a dream to be a tennis player, when I was a kid in Belgium.

“I never thought about like doing all the media and the press conferences and the sponsors, and I know it’s all part of it, but to me it was very draining. And also the environment right, you have so many people that want something from you, not knowing who you can trust, those kind of things and it made it very clear.”

Clijsters would come out of retirement just two years later, winning the 2009 US Open at her first Grand Slam tournament back as a wildcard.

However, she would not play on the WTA Tour for much longer and would retire again in 2012.

That was not the end of the story for Clijsters, as she would attempt to make one final comeback in 2020, before officially ending her career in 2022.