Update June 2026

The fluent strokemaker who just needs to stay healthy

If injuries hadn’t slowed the progress of Karolina Muchová on several occasions, who knows what she might have won by now?

The Czech player looked to have broken through, when she reached the Roland-Garros final in 2023, taking the seemingly invincible Iga Świątek to three sets. And after reaching the US Open semi-finals three months later, she was up to eighth in the rankings. But a wrist problem derailed the rest of her year, necessitating surgery twice in 2024. Such has been the career of one of the most elegant strokemakers in modern-day women’s tennis.

Ever since Martina Navratilova blazed a trail on the women’s Tour in the 1970s, a conveyor belt of talent has flowed out of Czech tennis. From Hana Mandlíková to Petr Korda and Jana Novotná, and Petra Kvitová to Barbora Krejčíková, Czechia, a country of just under 11 million people, has produced a string of Grand Slam champions, runners-up and world number ones.

Karolina Muchová looked to be the latest of them when she broke onto the WTA Tour after the Covid-19 pandemic of 2020. Born in Olomouc between Brno and Ostrava in the Czech Republic, the daughter of a former footballer Josef Mucha, Muchová really caught the attention of the tennis public when she reached the semi-finals at the 2021 Australian Open. She beat the former French Open champion Jeļena Ostapenko in the first round, and then beat two world number ones, Karolina Plíšková in the third round and Ashleigh Barty in the quarters.

Muchová was at school when Kvitová won her two Wimbledon titles in 2011 and 2014, and even though she did not watch them live, she was inspired by the left-hander, herself a national hero in the Czech Republic.

But it was the performance of fellow Head player Krejčíková at the 2021 French Open, where she won her first Grand Slam singles title and added the doubles crown, that really helped Muchová believe she too can enjoy success at the very highest level.

“It’s amazing, what Barbora did, in doubles and singles,” Muchová says. “It gave me confidence. It definitely showed me that it’s really open on the women’s side. At each Grand Slam, there can be a new champion. That’s good – good to see and good to know.”

Muchová followed up her Australian Open semi-final by reaching the last eight at Wimbledon five months later. “I learnt that I can really go far in tournaments,” she said of her impressive progress in 2021. “It boosted my confidence. I always thought I can go deep in Grand Slams and this was like a little click that showed me I can really, really do it.”

That led everyone to hope and assume that a run of injuries from her junior days was now behind her. Unfortunately it wasn’t. In the final set of a fascinating third round match at Roland-Garros in 2022, she twisted her ankle and had to retire hurt.

A year later, that seemed a distant memory, when she played a superb tournament in Paris to beat Aryna Sabalenka from match point down in the semi-finals, and then take Świątek the full distance in the final. “If only Karolina can stay fit …” the tennis world seemed to say.

But her run to the semi-finals of the 2023 US Open took its toll. In her quarter-final she aggravated her right wrist, and while she won the match, it wrecked the rest of her year. She opted for surgery in early 2024, and by September she was back in the US Open semis.

“I don't like to talk about injuries,” Muchová said after reaching the last four. “I've been through a lot of them. This last one, the wrist surgery, was one of the worst. Looking back, I’m like, ‘Oh, the time actually flew by,’ and I feel strong again. But [in] February, I wasn't always that positive. It was tough moments, honestly, when I couldn’t move the arm and couldn’t do much.”

Yet that second US Open semi-final caused problems in her left wrist, leading to an operation on that in October 2024. Returning in 2025, lingering problems with the left wrist meant she could still not hit her two-handed backhand, yet such is her beautiful technique on the single-handed slice and her natural volleying ability that she was able to win several matches without a topspin backhand.

That suggests that Karolina Muchová could yet have some big titles in her if she can sort out her injuries. She has such natural talent and generates support from all tennis crowds that the tennis world wishes her well. And she comes from that factory of success that is the Czech tennis scene.

“We have so many good Czech players so we can compete against each other,” she says. “You want to be better than the others. We can practise together. You can look up to them. A few years back when I was ranked 200, I looked up to them. And that’s good competition, it pushes you more.”

Words by Simon Cambers and Chris Bowers