Simona Halep, former world No. 1 and two-time Grand Slam champion, shocked the tennis world in February 2025 when she announced her retirement following a crushing 6-1, 6-1 loss to Lucia Bronzetti at the Transylvania Open in her hometown of Cluj-Napoca.
But that defeat was only the beginning of a new chapter — one Halep never saw coming, filled with surprising goals, heart-felt confessions, and a life beyond the baseline that she’s only now starting to embrace.
💔 Goodbye Match, Soulful Goodbye
Halep didn’t just leave the court. She stood there, in front of the fans, with raw honesty. “I wanted to come here today in Cluj to play in front of you and say goodbye,” she said. “My body can no longer sustain the effort it takes to get back to where I once was… Life goes on, there is life after tennis.”
For years she struggled — dealing with a tough doping suspension (later reduced), recurring knee and shoulder pain, and a body that simply couldn’t keep pace with the grind of top-level tennis
🔄 Simona’s Unexpected New Goals
Retirement was not the end for Halep — it was a pivot. In the weeks following her farewell, she revealed two enormous surprises that have captured the imagination of fans everywhere.
1. Golf?
She plans to learn golf — from scratch. Halep says she no longer wants strict schedules or the constant pressure. What she wants, she says, is freedom: to play a new sport, just for enjoyment.
2. Family, Motherhood, Normalcy
Perhaps even more emotionally charged was her admission that she wants to be a mother. “I want to be a mother. A good mother, like my mother. I want to have children, when the time is right.” After years of chasing every break point, chasing every ranking, it seems now she’s chasing something more deeply personal.
