Do Tigers Roar?

The last few months have seemed like the Aryna Sabalenka show on the WTA tour. After being forced out of Wimbledon with a shoulder injury and a slightly slow start to the North American swing, she hit top gear in Cincinnati, walloping world number 1, Iga Swiatek and Jessica Pegula in the final. Sabalenka followed that up with a great run to the US Open title – her second major title of 2024 and third in total – moving ahead of the 2 slams group. Asia has been a happy hunting ground in the past for the Belarussian, and so it proved this year. A surprising loss to the super talented Karolina Muchova in Bejing quarter final was her only loss and this week, she won the Wuhan 1000 title for three straight titles – 2018, 2019 and with the pandemic and China issues for the WTA this was the first time tour returned. That’s 20/21 match wins since early August.

However, while winning 3 of the last 4 major tournaments on the tour looks like dominance, Sabalenka certainly didn’t have things all her own way. Indeed, I don’t think she played her best in Wuhan. In an interview with Courtney Nguyen on the WTA Insider Champions Corner podcast, she commented on how very slow and heavy the court and balls were. Wuhan was nicknamed Wuhanbledon in the past as it played so fast, and champions were Venus Williams, Petra Kvitova and Aryna Sabalenka. All players who loved fast courts. In the 5 year absence, new courts were laid and these new courts apparently played a lot slower, so a different challenge for Sabalenka.

Sabalenka was pretty fortunate to survive the semifinal against Coco Gauff – who has had a real resurgence in the last week or so. Gauff has been struggling for a lot of the year with her serve and forehand. After losses to Emma Navarro at Wimbledon and the US Open, she parted ways with her coach Brad Gilbert. Going into the Bejing final, she hadn’t looked much better. Gauff is such a good mover and a scrapper on court, her technical weaknesses seemed to being covered up. Many – including me – thought Karolina Muchova might start putting right her incomprehensible talent: titles ratio (one 250 in Seoul being her only WTA title). But that Bejing final was an absolute beatdown by Gauff, who suddenly looked like all her troubles had disappeared! Forehand was a weapon, serve only went off for one game. Muchova also did not play well, but Coco was red hot!

The Wuhan semifinal between Gauff and Sabalenka looked like a close one on paper. Coco had maintained her good form. Although a few double faults had crept in, she had not been troubled. Sabalenka had fought back from losing the first set 6-1 to the tricky Yulia Putinseva to get a great comeback win, then hit 42 winners to 14 errors in dismantling a pretty game Magdelena Frech.

But wow, what a first set from Coco! She played about as well as I have ever seen her play! Hitting smart, deep ground strokes. Serving well but also returning ALL of Sabalenka’s big shots. Aryna was not hitting her spots on serve and Coco was just chasing everything down and sending it back with interest. When she got a break in set 2 it looked like Sabalenka’s Wuhan unbeaten record would be going. Then…

WUHAN, CHINA – OCTOBER 12: Coco Gauff of United States reacts against Aryna Sabalenka in the Women’s Singles semifinal match during the day eight of the 2024 Wuhan Open at Optics Valley International Tennis Center on October 12, 2024 in Wuhan, China. (Photo by Wang He/Getty Images)

Aryna Sabalenka knows a thing or two about hitting double faults but Gauff’s 21 double faults – including one on match point to hand the victory to Sabalenka – was the most by anyone this year I believe. I am no Coco fan, but I felt bad for her. It really was like watching 2022 Aryna – and look how far she has come! Quite honestly, the way she has played in the last few weeks with her new coach – and a more solid looking forehand – has to be highly encouraging for her and her fans. She had Aryna on the ropes. Yes, the court was slow, but Coco looked great – and still only 20 years old. I do wonder if we got a glimpse of future Coco, who with the technical kinks ironed out would surely be a future number 1, or if this was just a good patch? But, if there is one player who knows how to win ugly, it is Sabalenka. The way she has become so strong mentally is one of the reasons I have added her to my list of favourites. Her hot-headedness is not all the way banished – she threw away a winning position against Muchova and has had several collapses from winning positions in the last couple of years. But the fact is, she gets herself into those positions, and more often than not, is holding strong.

The final in Wuhan was between Sabalenka and Chinese superstar Qinwen Zheng. After winning the singles gold medal at the Olympics in Paris this year, Qinwen has been the face of tennis in China, and the huge crowds in Bejing and in Wuhan for her was great to see. By the way, a quick word of huge appreciation for the Chinese fans. In the past, these tournaments have been poorly attended and atmosphere-less as those who did attend didn’t seem engaged. It has been brilliant to see all of the Chinese fans treat the WTA players like pop stars, giving them presents, making their own banners and posters and cheering. I also absolutely love how they gasp and ‘oooh!’ in delight or disappointment. I’m sure Coco didn’t feel any better when there were load groans from the crowd when she missed a first serve! But the fact they were so engaged in the tennis was fantastic. The absence of WTA tennis ha apprently made the heart grow fonder..

Anyway, maybe it is the Qinwen factor, but these tournaments have been a lot of fun – apart from the horrible time difference for me in the UK! The final (which was on at the same time of the Shanghai ATP final between Jannik Sinner and Novak Djokovic. Guess which match Sky Sports showed??) was looking like business as usual for Sabalenka. She won the first set 6-3 and had chances in set 2 but lost a bit of concentration and focus and Qinwen, buoyed by the increasingly excitable crowd went on the offensive. Qinwen has a weird serve – I saw someone on Reddit describe it as like watching a buffering video – and while she has a decent forehand, she ultimately was no match for Sabalenka’s greater power and experience.

Sabalenka now leads the WTA Race and only trails Iga Swiatek by 69 ranking points in the official rankings, with only the WTA finals to go. Iga is defending 1500 points as champion, while Sabalenka lost in the semifinals. To have the year end world number 1 ranking on the line going into those finals is quite exciting. Seeing as Iga Swiatek has not been on court since losing badly to Jess Pegula at the US Open, it is going to be fascinating. In that time, Swiatek has split with long time coach, Tomasz Wiktorowski, so what is her headspace right now? While the undisputed world number 1 all the way to Roland Garros, since then it has been a series of losses and no titles. Losses to Putinseva at Wimbledon, Qinwen at the Olympics, Sabalenka in Cincinnati and Pegula at the USO. For many of us tennis watchers, it is the manner of Iga’s losses that are concerning, and also her attittude. Iga seems to go almost into panic mode when she is losing. The Pegula loss was especially puzzling as she was frankly awful. Yes, Jess hit the ball hard and deep but Iga looked so flumoxed and just had no answers. She is such a good player, but seems to have no plan B. It will be fascinating to see if her new coach and Iga herself try to address this. She is a very different personality than the extrovert and open Aryna Sabalenka, who deals with adversity so well. Iga is superb as a frony runner, but this could be the next big test for her.

Right now, Aryna Sabalenka FEELS like the world number 1 and has all the momentum. Of course, we need to see what the courts are like in Riyadh. They are unlikely to be super fast, but we shall see. As the winner of 2 grand slam titles, I’d love to see Sabalenka end the year as number 1.

She even has a song written for her that the DJ in Wuhan played! I kinda like it!

Comments

Leave a Reply