Surrounded by a few new faces, Eugenie Bouchard practices at the Australian Open

MELBOURNE, Australia – Nursing a slight niggle, Genie Bouchard was a no-show for both her practice sessions Thursday, the first of which was on Rod Laver Arena.

But the Canadian was back in action Friday, hitting for nearly 90 minutes – although we didn't see her practice her serve.

Here's what it looked like.

The team around Bouchard has changed since we last saw her in Singapore at the WTA Tour Finals back in October.

Gone is coach Nick Saviano, who is in Melbourne with another long-time pupil, Sloane Stephens (and has to coach her through the toughest non-seed first-round matchup imaginable, Victoria Azarenka).

In his place is Diego Ayala, a former coach at Saviano's academy who is coach, hitting partner, temporary solution, to be re-evaluated – take your pick of official designations.

Tom Burn, the hitting partner who was with Bouchard through the second half of last season, giving some stability to the job after some musical chairs in that department during the first half, was not on hand.

We're almost 100 per cent positive we spotted Burn on site earlier Friday; the hitting partner who was on court with Bouchard on Friday, Jack, was definitely someone else.

Poor guy; he struggled. And Bouchard got a little impatient with him, although she was never rude. He had trouble handling her feeds with he was hitting volleys at the net. And he had trouble hitting his spots on serve when she was practising her return. In fact, he had some trouble getting the serve, and his volleys, over the net at all.

Also not here is Dr. Marie-Christine Gougoux, the chiropractor who also served as a physio, a taper, chief cook and bottle washer and kept Bouchard in fairly good nick through the U.S. Open and, most especially, in Singapore.

Fed Cup captain Sylvain Bruneau was at the practice session.

In short, it's not the same tight-knit group that had formed some chemistry for several successful months last year.

That's an understatement.

One thing worth mentioning is that it was pretty obvious Bouchard put in the hard yards in the gym during the off-season – focusing particularly on the upper body. She's ripped, as you can see from some the photos above.