Katie Boulter ended her 2025 WTA Tour season on the courts of Hong Kong, teary-eyed after suffering an injury during her match against Alexandra Eala.
The last few weeks of the season were tough on Boulter, and after her retirement against Eala, she revealed that her recent injury issues have been ‘draining.‘
Amid these injury concerns and inconsistent form, Boulter has fallen down the rankings to world number 100.
It has been a sharp decline for the 29-year-old, who achieved her career high ranking of world number 23 in November 2024.
Boulter has also struggled with her serve, something which she has acknowledged in the past.
Andrea Petkovic, formerly the world number nine, discussed this issue while speaking on a podcast with three-time Wimbledon champion Boris Becker.
Andrea Petkovic says Katie Boulter has the ‘yips’ on her serve
The ‘yips’ describes a state of significant nervousness that consistently affects an action or movement which ordinarily would be simply executed.
Andrea Petkovic, who won seven WTA Tour titles during her career, believes Katie Boulter is dealing with this issue when serving.
“Katie Boulter – I hope she’ll pull herself together again,” Petkovic said on the Becker Petkovic podcast.
“A fantastic player, was already in the top 20, and she has unfortunately – we have talked about it so many times on our podcast – unfortunately, she just has the yips.
“The serve… Katie Boulter, she always hits slice serves, doesn’t kick the second. She didn’t make many double faults, but when she got nervous, she made double faults, because of course, if you serve slice, it’s much riskier when your arm gets tight than when you serve a kick.
“Biljana Veselinovic [her coach] is a really good, experienced trainer. They also brought in a biomechanic from outside, an Englishman, and he went to Katie Boulter in the off-season.
“They practised kick serves every day. Worked on it for hours. I know Biljana very well, she told me that Katie was sceptical at first, but got involved.
“They did that all off-season. She comes to the United Cup, plays fantastic, almost beats Iga Swiatek, so plays really, really well, comes to the Australian Open, loses the first round and then makes an average of 10-16 doubles [double faults.]
“And then suddenly came this doubt, maybe I shouldn’t have done that. That’s precisely this risk that we don’t see, because an Alcaraz and a Sinner somehow manage to bridge it.
What is stopping Katie Boulter from staying in the WTA top 20?
“But with many others, we never talk about them again, it goes wrong. We always talk about those where it works, where it goes well.
“No, there are so many players who want to change their game, even improve it. And then it just doesn’t work.”
Katie Boulter’s last five WTA Tour tournaments of 2025
Since exiting the US Open in the first round, Katie Boulter has performed inconsistently on the WTA Tour.
The Brit’s most notable performance came in Osaka, where she defeated China Open finalist Linda Noskova.
However, she has also struggled, most notably against Eva Lys in Japan – the 29-year-old fell to a 6-2, 6-1 loss against the young German star.
| Tournament | Round Reached | Opponent |
| China Open | Second Round | Amanda Anisimova |
| Wuhan Open | Second Round | Viktoriya Tomova |
| Osaka Open | Second Round | Sorana Cirstea |
| Japan Open | First Round [won two qualifying rounds] | Eva Lys |
| Hong Kong Open | First Round | Alexandra Eala |
Boulter will hope to improve upon her form in 2026 and rise back up the WTA rankings.
