"Absolutely, whenever you take over a new job you try to implement things you feel are better for that player and for me I felt Marina had lost what made her a great player, her ability to do certain things so I wanted to go back to what's worked for her. It's always a process and sometimes doing that you don't always get the results straight away." Whitehouse said.
Those things that made Erakovic a top 50 player notching up wins over the likes of former world number one Victoria Azarenka, and current world number seven Dominika Cibulkova, are her forehand and serve.
"Her serve and forehand are massive weapons for her and she doesn't always use that as much as she's could. We've been working on that and it's also tough when you have been injured and don't get the results that you want."
Whitehouse felt Erakovic had fixed a little kink in her service motion and was now more confident and aggressive moving forward while mentally she had remained strong despite the form slump.
"Marina is a very tough person, she deals with things really well and is very professional and she's in a positive frame of mind."
Her opponent Shelby Rogers reached the quarter finals in Paris last year before losing to the eventual champion Garbine Muguruza and will thrive on the memories of her superb run, a best Grand Slam performance to date for the 24 year old.
But Whitehouse says with that result comes pressure to defend the points she gained last year.
"I think Marina will try to capitalise on that and use that as much as she can. Also the fact that Marina had a lot of opportunities in Miami (Rogers won 7-6 in the third set) and should have snuck that one and that will play on Shelby's mind for sure."
Paris is in the middle of a heatwave with the temperatures forecast to climb towards the mid 30's on the opening day. Whitehouse believes that will suit Erakovic.
It will work out quite nicely for her because it will make the courts faster which is good for Marina and for the game style that she's going to play.
Meanwhile Kiwi doubles specialist Marcus Daniell and his Brazilian partner Marcelo Demoliner have lost the doubles final at the ATP tournament in Lyon.
They've been beaten 6-3, 3-6, 10-5 by Argentine Andres Molteni and Canadian Adil Shamasdin in one hour and 22 minutes. Daniell will still head to Paris in a confident mood with his ranking expected to rise three places to 45.
Matt Brown is at the French Open thanks to Emirates Airline
