'I broke the curse' - the fall and rise of a teenage Grand Slam champion

Sport Insight'I broke the curse' - the fall and rise of a teenage Grand Slam championPublished19 May 2026Image source, Getty ImagesByNathan EdwardsBBC Sport journalistBianca Andreescu stood with the US Open trophy aloft, smiling as glittering confetti fell all around her on Arthur Ashe Stadium. It was September 2019. The teenager had just beaten the great Serena Williams and, at 19 years old, reached the pinnacle of tennis.In that moment, she could not have thought it would be more than 2,300 days before she would win another title - nor that the one she did would have a prize of $3,000 (£2,200), less than 0.1% of her $3.9m (£2.9m) earnings at Flushing Meadows.She might not have expected to return to the lower tiers of professional tennis, where there are no free towels at tournaments and players often have to retrieve their own balls.But after years of injuries, that was where the Canadian headed in a bid to rebuild what had been such a promising career.Andreescu's US Open victory capped off a year that also included an Indian Wells title and a Canadian Open win in her hometown of Toronto, and had propelled her up the world rankings.She had announced herself to the world - but then it all started going wrong.A knee injury enforced a break at the start of 2020 and the tennis calendar was then paused because of the Covid pandemic. When she walked out to play in February 2021, it was her first time on the court for 16 months.She also admits she had not been ready for life as a Grand Slam champion."I don't think it's possible to really prepare yourself [for a Grand Slam victory], especially if you haven't gone through that before, but I wish I had a little bit more guidance after the US Open," Andreescu, now 25, tells BBC Sport."You think you know everything at 19, and I just remember I'm not one to ever ask for help, but I am a little bit better at that now. So maybe if I did, things would have been different."Her...