Can coach Wim Fissette help Victoria Mboko win a Grand Slam? She thinks so

For a teenager who has already written her own story faster than expected, Victoria Mboko hopes that the addition of coach Wim Fissette will help her write her boldest chapter yet.

The Canadian debuted a new partnership with the decorated Belgian coach last week at the Internationaux de Strasbourg, where she played her way to the final before losing in three sets to a resurgent Emma Navarro.

The 19-year-old had not yet played a Grand Slam tournament before arriving in Paris last year, where she successfully qualified and reached the third round. That result, it could be argued, was the start of the meteoric rise that has her sitting in the Top 10 12 months later.

Fissette has coached major winners including Victoria Azarenka, Kim Clijsters, Naomi Osaka and Iga Swiatek, among others. His partnership with the last of those ending after the Miami Open in March, and Mboko hopes that her name will soon join that list of decorated champions.

"I think bringing in someone who has the experience of working with such high-ranked players, and he has such a history of working with Slam champions, and he kind of knows what it takes to get there," she said Monday ahead of her first-round Roland Garros match against Nikola Bartunkova.

"So bringing in that kind of experience for me kind of gives me a different perspective of what I can do to be in those kinds of positions."

If the effort in Strasbourg was any indication, the combination is already bearing fruit.

Mboko confessed that she never would've believed that she would've reached the final of the tournament after an "unlucky" stretch that included wisdom teeth surgery and an illness that forced her to withdraw from the WTA 1000 in Rome, as well as a short history with the nuances of clay-court tennis.

"When I first started training, I mean, I never really felt comfortable with my movement on clay," she said. "So I think before even getting to the tennis part, I would try to work on the sliding and what not.

"I wouldn't say I'm still that great at it, but I think it's having the fitness to kind of compensate for how you play on court and to kind of help you in those certain aspects. I think right now I'm a lot better than how I started the training, so I think in those ways I've improved."

"I'm hoping that I'll do well here," she added. "I'm very excited ahead of the tournament, and I hope I can win as many matches as possible."