London - Outside her own family, nobody in tennis has known Maria Sharapova longer than Nick Bollettieri, who was sure of one thing yesterday. “If Maria says she will come back to tennis, she'll be back,” the veteran coach told The Independent.
“She's not the sort of person who would throw in the towel. She will prove to the world that while it's possible for anyone to make a mistake, she will come back showing all the strength that has made her the great champion she is today.”
Bollettieri has known Sharapova since she was nine, when her father, Yuri, brought her from the family home on Russia's Black Sea coast to train at his academy in Bradenton, Florida.
She was part of a talented group of young girls that included Jelena Jankovic and Tatiana Golovin. “When she was 12 or 13, Maria used to scare the shit out of them,” Bollettieri recalled. “She intimidated them with her game and with the sheer force of her personality.”
Tennis great Billie Jean King defends Maria Sharapova over drugs test failure. https://t.co/AAcSNG3INE
— BBC Radio 4 Today (@BBCr4today) March 9, 2016
Sharapova will need all her legendary mental strength if she is to come back from the crisis that has engulfed her since she admitted two days ago that she had tested positive for a banned drug, Meldonium. She insisted she had been taking it for medical reasons for 10 years after being diagnosed with the first signs of diabetes, a magnesium deficiency and irregular heart patterns.
The 28-year-old Russian admitted she was the only person to blame for failing to read a communication from the World Anti-Doping Agency at the end of last year informing all athletes that Meldonium had been added to its prohibited list.
Wada has evidence that athletes have been using the drug “with the intention of enhancing performance”. An International Tennis Federation hearing will eventually determine the degree of Sharapova's guilt and the length of her ban, which could be between one and two years.
Maria Sharapova is losing sponsors https://t.co/WuAc67eKSU
— Fortune (@FortuneMagazine) March 8, 2016
Whether or not Sharapova was taking the drug for genuine medical reasons or for performance-enhancing purposes - and she insists she has always used it on medical advice - what is perhaps most surprising in this affair is her very carelessness.
How could someone as organised as Sharapova have failed to read the notice emailed to her in December outlining the changes in Wada's banned list for 2016? The whole document amounts to only nine sentences.
Sharapova is usually meticulously professional in everything she does. Her dedication to her recovery programmes when she has fought back from surgery and injury has been unswerving.
After undergoing shoulder surgery when she was 21, Sharapova had to make a particularly long and painful journey back to the top. She did not play a singles match for 10 months and had to remodel her service action. Ever since then she has had to manage her shoulder constantly with exercises and careful treatment.
She has a reputation for turning up on time for meetings - even for press interviews, which is by no means the case with many players - and is painstakingly diligent in her business dealings. She likes to be in charge of all her own affairs, which may explain why she chose to “out” herself this week rather than wait for the news of her failed test to emerge from other sources.
Four years ago, on the morning after she completed her full set of Grand Slam titles by winning the French Open, she boarded a budget flight to Spain, where she spent two days putting the final touches to her most ambitious commercial operation yet, her Sugarpova confectionery enterprise.
The Russian has put her own money into the business, which has been very successful, rather than simply lend her name to someone else's project.
In her spare time, even when she is on tour, Sharapova loves to immerse herself in sales figures for products she is involved with, read consumer reports and talk to sales managers. She is not one for small talk.
. @serenawilliams says @MariaSharapova has shown "courage" in admitting she failed a drugs test. https://t.co/V6Alczz0aC
— Channel 4 News (@Channel4News) March 8, 2016
“I don't spend a lot of my time in the locker room,” she once told The Independent. “That's my least favourite place in the world. I do my job at the site. I play my matches. I do what I have to do and I prefer to live my life away from the site rather than talk tennis all day.”
Bollettieri said Sharapova was the same when she was practising. “Once her work is done, she's gone,” he said. “She doesn't like to hang around. There's no bullshitting afterwards with the other players. It's all business.”
There is probably no player on the tour who would call Sharapova a close friend and there may not be much sympathy for her around the locker room this week. Many players find her aloof and even intimidating.
The Russian's will to win is second to none. She allows nothing to get in her way, as those who witnessed her 2006 Miami semi-final against her Bradenton contemporary Golovin will recall. Golovin suffered a serious ankle injury in the third set and eventually had to retire. While Golovin was being treated on the court Sharapova appeared to show a callous lack of interest as she did everything to stay focused on her task.
Nevertheless, Sharapova has always had a close and tight relationship with her working team. Max Eisenbud, the agent who has helped make her the world's highest-earning female athlete for more than a decade, is especially close to her.
One of the reasons Bollettieri cannot believe that Sharapova has ever cheated deliberately is the quality of the men who have coached her. “I know people like Robert Lansdorp, Thomas Hogstedt and Sven Groeneveld extremely well,” he said. “There is no way that they would ever allow themselves to be associated with anything like that.”
There has been no greater influence on Sharapova's career than her father, Yuri, who could be an intimidating courtside figure in her early days, but he has rarely travelled to tournaments in recent years. “I still see him quite a lot at the academy, but these days he seems more interested in skiing than in tennis,” Bollettieri said.
Nike suspends Maria Sharapova endorsement deal https://t.co/2P54OYeL1g https://t.co/pBqivrtQpb
— New Day (@NewDay) March 8, 2016
Sharapova is one of the world's most glamorous women, but her personal relationships with men have not endured. Last summer she split with her fellow player, Grigor Dimitrov, after they had been together for two years. She had previously been engaged to the basketball player Sasha Vujacic but they parted after two years, blaming the pressure of their professional schedules. She is also said to have had a relationship with the Maroon 5 singer Adam Levine.
Corny as it may sound, Sharapova appears to have had no greater love than tennis. Given her many off-court interests and her wealth, she could have given up the sport long ago without affecting her long-term wealth. However, despite numerous physical setbacks - for example she has been able to play only three tournaments in the last eight months and is currently troubled by an arm injury - she cannot keep away from the court. To use a timely phrase, it is as if tennis has been a drug she cannot give up.
“I really love playing,” she said when asked at the end of last year how she kept her motivation. “There's nothing else that really gives me that feeling and that competitiveness and the thrill, the emotion that I get on court.”
The Independent