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Mixed doubles, even in defeat, just what the doctor ordered for Eugenie Bouchard

A big smile for opponent Mike Bryan after Genie Bouchard and mixed doubles partner Max Mirnyi were beat in the first round at the French Open. In fact, smiles all around. (Stephanie Myles/Opencourt.ca)

PARIS – Eugenie Bouchard was sitting in an interview room early Thursday evening at Roland Garros, talking about a lost tennis match.

And she was smiling.

The scene was remarkably different than just two days before, when she faced a sea of mostly unfamiliar faces in a massive press conference, trying to find answers for her first-round loss to Kristina Mladenovic.

This time, she was in tiny Room 4 - a room that, given the severe slope on the back wall, is probably nestled right underneath the stands on Court Philippe Chatrier. There were only a few journalists, most of the faces at least vaguely familiar. And the match she lost was her first-round mixed doubles match with Max Mirnyi of Belarus against the No. 2 seeds, Americans Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Mike Bryan.

With Mirnyi's longtime nickname being "The Beast", the potential headlines there were far too easy to write - if you know what we mean.

Bouchard sounded a little congested, but that seemed to be the biggest problem she had on the day. "It was fun. it was fun to return men’s serves, practice some volleys, play some pressure deuce points – which we lost most of," she said.

Here are some highlights.

If it was a sight for sore eyes for the 21-year-old's loyal army of fans to see their heroine actually smiling and having fun on a tennis court, it had to be no less enjoyable for Bouchard herself after so many months of losses, struggles, and press conferences filled with strangers where she tried, once again, to psychoanalyze herself and figure out what went wrong.

It was a great way to end her stay in Paris. And as she looks ahead to the grass-court season, she said she was considering perhaps playing (women's) doubles at her warm-up events. It's a long overdue idea.

There were questions for Bouchard. In the more intimate setting, where her answers weren't being passed around to everyone not in attendance via transcripts and/or video, it was the an opportune moment.

Bouchard drilled Mirnyi in the head at one point, which elicited a chuck, a I deserved that one and a low one from the affable Belarussian. (Stephanie Myles/opencourt.ca)
Bouchard drilled Mirnyi in the head at one point, which elicited a chuck, a I deserved that one and a low one from the affable Belarussian. (Stephanie Myles/opencourt.ca)

Philippe Cantin, star columnist for one of Bouchard's hometown newspapers, La Presse, had quite a few, many pertaining to the hit her star power has taken on her home turf in Quebec this season. He asked nicely, but he didn't hold back. And Bouchard held her own well, even in French.

She was asked about social media, and the perception that she doesn't work hard enough, or train hard enough, that she spends her time socializing and partying (and Instagramming about it) – that's where all those Anna Kournikova references seem to come in.

Your Eh Game correspondent always defends Bouchard on that score. Whatever else you want to say about her, the notion that the Montrealer isn't working her tail off, and that she doesn't want do everything she needs to do to be the best tennis player she can be, is ludicrous.

Bouchard's answer spoke to that.

"I put up photos of practice (too), I put up photos in the gym. People will say anything. But if it takes me 15 seconds to put something on social media, that doesn’t mean I didn’t train six hours that day," she said. "If I’m not allowed to to go the movies, or a restaurant, or visit the Eiffel Tower that means I’m not training?  I don’t know. I don’t understand."

On the perception that she has lost some strength (i.e., the weight loss since Australia that pretty much everyone has noticed – even those who don't see her live but only in photos and on television, which adds pounds), Bouchard once again didn't answer directly.

But her answer about her new physical trainer (she's been working with Victoria Azarenka's old trainer, Laurent Laffite, on a trial basis since Rome) was revealing.

"I always felt good physically, but people around me said they thought I hadn’t progressed enough. If that was the case, it really wasn’t good because I wanted to progress a lot, at least over a year.  I don’t know if it was true or not, because I always felt good on the court," she said. "I changed physical trainers, and I think I’ve taken some steps in the right direction with that."

Bouchard then looked over to agent Jill Smoller, who was in the room, smiled, flexed her biceps and said, "I want to have more muscles for sure … I want to be like Serena." (Smoller is also Williams's agent).

Now that Bouchard is working with Azarenka's old coach, and her old trainer, the comparisons are inevitable. But Bouchard is not the physical specimen Azarenka is; she's not nearly as solidly built. In fact, if you heard any criticism of the old regime it was that former trainer Scott Byrnes must be working her TOO hard, because it seemed one little niggling injury or another has been popping up with regularity over the last year.

Bouchard smiles on court during her mixed-doubles match at the French Open May 28. For more tennis, go to opencourt.ca
Bouchard smiles on court during her mixed-doubles match at the French Open May 28. For more tennis, go to opencourt.ca

So we'll have to see where that road leads. Certainly her stamina in matches seems on point; on that hot, windy day in Rome against Carla Suárez Navarro, the tireless Spaniard Energizer Bunny was the one who ran out of legs long before Bouchard did.

(On a completely unrelated note, funny how small a world tennis is sometimes. Mirnyi is Azarenka's Belarussian countryman; the two combined to win the 2007 U.S. Open mixed doubles title as well a gold medal in mixed at the Olympics in London in 2012. And Bouchard's agent has known him since he was a junior).

Bouchard mentioned the loss to qualifier Lesia Tsurenko in the third round at Indian Wells as the one that seemed to deal an especially big blow to her confidence, the fallout of which she carried through Miami, the clay tournament in Charleston and the Fed Cup tie in Montreal. 

Asked by Cantin what she would say, if it were her fans sitting there in the room rather than the media, about her struggles, she answered this way:

"I’d say that life isn’t perfect, and it doesn’t always go the way you want it to. I had a very good year last year, and maybe I won’t have the same results as last year. Maybe I’ll have a year like last year next year, or in two years. And maybe an even better year in three years. You never know." she said. "I don’t know why everyone is panicking a bit because I'm not doing exactly what I did last year. That makes no sense to me. There are highs and lows. Right now is a bit of a low. But I believe in my abilities and that I can come back."