Kristina Mladenovic might have been a German tennis star if her father, Dragan, an Olympic gold medalist in team handball for Yugoslavia, had decided to make a move to the German Handball Bundesliga, the top European league, in 1992.

Instead, Dragan chose to leave Serbia to play in the city of Dunkirk in northern France and ended up staying for 12 seasons with his growing family, which added Kristina in 1993.

“It’s true that this could all have turned out very differently,” Kristina Mladenovic said in a recent interview. “It is a coincidence in a way that I was born in France, but I’m delighted.”

With the French Open set to begin on Sunday, the French are increasingly delighted, too. At 24, Mladenovic is in the midst of her most convincing season and at a career-high ranking of No. 14 after reaching clay-court finals in Stuttgart, Germany, and Madrid.