Caroline Wozniacki Boyfriend Rory McIlroy: Tennis' Former Number 1 Ready for Wimbledon, Opens Up About Career and Romance

As former WTA no. 1 Caroline Wozniacki prepares for Wimbledon, her relationship with golfer Rory McIlroy has once again come under fire. Falling from the top-ranked player to her current ranking of number 9, many critics blamed her decline on her romance with McIlroy. Both athletes deny this claim and have stood strong against the criticism over the last few years. During some downtime on one of her regular Tour stops, the 22-year-old tennis champion opened up about her relationship with McIlroy and her career.

"There will always be critics out there," she said. "There'll be people, too, who pat you on the shoulder and say you're unbelievable but who don't really mean it. Then there'll be people who are on you all the time; they don't really mean it either but just don't have anything better to do; and then there are the journalists who need to write articles. They need to have something that people want to read about and you have to respect that. But at the same time I need to respect myself, too, and I respect what I've done. I think that's something very special. I love proving people wrong. It's something I've done my whole life. It's something I enjoy doing. I find it very satisfying."

"Golf and tennis follow the sun; we go around the world to pretty similar places. It's not easy, but we make it work," Wozniacki said of her relationship with McIlroy. "When you know, you know. I think what Rory and I have is very special. He's trying to work it out with his schedule, I'm trying to go and see him when I can, so in that way it's been working out well so far. We speak every day but we never have a set time where we have to speak. We just do it because we want to."

"I think I've done most things that I could in the tennis world," she said. "Obviously winning tournaments is something that is always a priority and of course I want to do well in the grand slams, because I've reached finals, semi-finals and quarter-finals, but I haven't won a grand slam yet. That's something that obviously I would like to do but again I don't put the pressure on myself because I believe when it's meant to be, my time will be, and that's basically it."

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