Naomi Osaka has had massive ups and downs in her tennis career. She is one of the most successful current generation athletes playing on the WTA Tour, with four Grand Slam titles. However, she has had a difficult time since last year’s French Open. The Japanese star withdrew from the 2021 Roland Garros after her first-round match owing to mental health issues. Since then, she has failed to hit top stride, having an inconsistent run across the tournaments.

Recently, Osaka was in San Jose to participate in the Silicon Valley Classic. However, she made an early exit from the tournament, losing against Coco Gauff of the United States. After the match, she opened up about people calling her mentally weak.

Naomi Osaka on handling pressure

The former World Number 1 took to Twitter to express her disagreement with people calling her mentally weak. She said, “When I was playing I realized I’ve been letting people call me mentally weak for so long that I forgot who I was. I lost today but I feel really confident in who I am. I feel like the pressure doesn’t beat me, I am the pressure. I’m really happy with that.” 

Further, she captioned the note, saying, “I stand by what I said.”

Osaka was making a comeback in San Jose after missing the grass-court season with an Achilles injury. She won her opening round match at the tournament against Qinwen Zheng of China. However, she couldn’t overcome the challenge of Gauff, who defeated her in straight sets, 6-4 6-4.

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Talking about her victory over Osaka, Gauff said, “The most proud was how I responded mentally. I could have easily folded in those couple of double faults and match points that I lost. But I kept telling myself, ‘Another point, another chance,’ and then the music kind of helped on the bench.”

Osaka to face Kaia Kanepi at the National Bank Open

After her disappointing exit in San Jose, Osaka will travel to Toronto to participate in the National Bank Open. She will open her campaign against Estonia’s Kaia Kanepi.

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The two have played against each other once before, with Kanepi prevailing in three sets in the round-of-32 at the US Open 2017. Can Osaka dig deep in Toronto? Let us know your views in the comments below.