Kristina Mladenovic called her recent 10-match losing streak a "great lesson" as she gears up for the Kremlin Cup in Moscow.

Mladenovic is close to entering the Top 10 despite an horrific end to the season and only needs to outperform Coco Vandeweghe to claim one of the alternate spots to the year-end WTA Championships in Singapore.

Mladenovic questions her scheduling

Following her first-round loss at the U.S. Open to Monica Niculescu, in which she only won five games, the St. Petersburg Open champion revealed she likely played too much, saying: "My schedule until Wimbledon and US Open was fine, but I realised now that I made a mistake after US Open with too many tournaments on my schedule."

Mladenovic added: "I cannot go back, but I definitely learned from it and it was a great lesson for sure. I will do some things differently next year".
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Injuries a factor in losing streak

Mladenovic enters Moscow not only on a ten-match losing streak, but she has not won a set in that period, injuries playing a factor.

"I had some issues after Wimbledon with my knee," she revealed. "I tore the inside ligament of my knee when I fell down in my second round match (against Alison Riske) and then I came back from the holidays and that problem was solved."

She continued: "I had some issue because of compensation and I couldn’t handle the pain and I thought that I would keep playing like this, because it was not the right period to take a break, but it definitely was a wrong choice."

Frenchwoman welcomes a return to Moscow

With her title in St. Petersburg earlier in the year and her fond memories of playing in Moscow, Mladenovic is pleased to return to Russia.

"I’m very happy to be back in Moscow," Mladenovic added. "I really like the tournament, I’ve been coming for several years and it feels different now. It feels actually very nice to be the top seed in such a great event.

"I came a little bit earlier so I can give myself better chances to be well-prepared for the tournament. I hope I can do it."

Mladenovic's slump continued as she lost her second round match to Aliaksandra Sasnovich 6-2, 2-6, 6-2 after receiving a first-round bye. However, she will be in Singapore as Vandeweghe lost her second-round match in straight sets to Lesia Tsurenko.

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John Lupo
I am a writer and photographer. I have two Instagrams: @lupojohn1 is my personal account while @dslr_transit_photos is my photography account as I do transit photography in my hometown of New York City.