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Halep hires new coach, Thomas Hogstedt to serve as consultant
Simona Halep has hired fellow Romanian Victor Ionita as her new coach for the 2015 season. In addition, Thomas Hogstedt, former coach to Maria Sharapova and Caroline Wozniacki, will serve as a coaching consultant for the first three tournaments of year at the Shenzhen Open, Sydney International and Australian Open. After being fired by Wozniacki after the Australian Open this year, Hogstedt began working with Sloane Stephens in July. Halep's manager Virginia Ruzici confirmed the hires.
Simona Halep opens up about split from coach Wim Fissette
After yet another breakthrough season in 2014 that saw Halep make her first Slam final at the French Open and finish the season at No. 3, the 23-year-old chose to split with coach Wim Fissette in favor of a Romanian coach. She's found that with Ionita, who coached her countrywoman Sorana Cirstea to a career-high No. 21 last year. Comparatively, Halep and Cirstea's games are complete opposites. Cirstea never saw a ball she didn't want to crush for a winner. But the hiring of Ionita and Hogstedt seem to signal Halep's continued desire to work more offense and aggression into her game.
Halep begins her season as the top seed at the Shenzhen Open on January 4th. In the meantime, she's already back to training:
Post by Simona Halep.
Mailbag: What makes a successful player-coach partnership?
This post has been updated.
Contributor, SI.com Nguyen is a freelance writer for SI.com, providing full coverage of professional tennis both on and off the court. Her content has become a must-read for fans and insiders to stay up-to-date with a sport that rarely rests. She has appeared on radio and TV talk shows all over the world and is one of the co-hosts of No Challenges Remaining, a weekly podcast available on iTunes. Nguyen graduated from the University of California, Irvine in 1999 and received a law degree from the University of California, Davis in 2002. She lives in the Bay Area.