Naomi Osaka Beats Petra Kvitova To Win Her First Australian Open Tennis Championships By Alix Ramsay

Naomi Osaka of Japan poses for photos with her trophy after winning the women’s singles final match against Petra Kvitova of Czech Republic at the Australian Open Grand Slam tennis tournament in Melbourne, Australia, 26 January 2019. EPA-EFE/MAST IRHAM

 

 

Heaven help the rest of the WTA Tour when Naomi Osaka grows up. True, she is 21 so, officially, she is an adult but in tennis terms, she is still maturing and developing – there is so much more for her to learn and perfect.

 

Yet despite the fact that in tennis years she is still only in her mid-teens, she is already the world No.1 and a two-time grand slam champion. On Saturday night she beat Petra Kvitova 7-6, 5-7, 6-4 to win the Australian Open in two hours and 27 minutes of blistering and bludgeoning tennis. Kvitova was brave, she was stubborn and she was cracking winners at every opportunity. But Osaka would not be beaten.

 

Not even when she saw three championship points vanish into thin air in the second set did the soon-to-be champion panic. At the time, Osaka was a break to the good and had three break points on the Kvitova serve – and then Kvitova snatched them back with clean winners. The two-time Wimbledon champion was not going to go down without one almighty struggle.

 

It was the only time in the tournament that Osaka had looked lost. She did not seem to know what to do while Kvitova’s roars of “Pojd!” (it means “come on” in Czech) grew louder and louder. By the time the pojds sounded like blood-curdling battle cries, the Czech had won five games in a row to wrap up the second set and claim the first game of the third.

 

But what has been so impressive about Osaka these past two weeks is the way she has thought her way out of trouble. Against the infuriatingly unorthodox Hseih Su-Wei and against Anastasija Sevastova and Karolina Pliskova, she had to work her way through three sets to find an answer to the problem in front of her. But that is one of her greatest strengths: the ability to solve problems in the heat of battle.

 

Against Kvitova, she was in tears after losing that second set and headed off court for a tactical bathroom break (Kvitova had done the same at the end of the first set so was not bothered by this move). When she returned, her remarkable inner calm had been restored and she set her sights on the title.

 

“You know how some people get worked up about things?” she said. “That’s a very human thing to do. Sometimes, I don’t know, like I feel like I don’t want to waste my energy doing stuff like that.

 

“I think about this on the court, too. Like in the third set of my match today, I literally just tried to turn off all my feelings. I just felt kind of hollow, like I was a robot sort of. I was just executing my orders. I don’t know. Like, I just did what I’ve been practicing my whole life in a way. I didn’t waste any energy reacting too much.”

 

She did not waste much energy celebrating, either. There were a few tears, the briefest of brief smiles and that was pretty much it. She looked unimpressed by the whole occasion.

 

“I forgot to smile,” she admitted with a giggle. “I was told to smile and I didn’t. I was panicking. Yeah, I’m going to be thinking about that for the rest of today.”

 

As for the presentation ceremony, she was all at sixes and sevens. Were to stand? Who to thank? Whose hand to shake first? Should she kiss Li Na or simply take the trophy from her? And what was she supposed to say in her speech?

 

“Umm, hello,” she began, to much laughing in the stands. “Sorry, public speaking really isn’t my strong side so I hope I can get through this. I read notes before this but I still forgot what I’m supposed to say.”

 

She was AUS$4.1million richer, she was on top of the world rankings and she was a grand slam champion again. But she barely knew it. Nothing had sunk in and nothing seemed real.

 

Just as in New York, the story had not really been about her. At the US Open it was all about Serena Williams and her pursuit of that record equalling 24th major trophy. When it all turned ugly, it was all about Serena and her fight with Carlos Ramos, the umpire. And then it was all about Serena’s meltdown.

 

In Melbourne, it had all been about Kvitova’s remarkable return from a knife attack in 2016. She was lucky to escape with her life when an intruder broke into her home in Prostejov. In the struggle, her assailant slashed her left hand so badly that the surgeon who repaired the damage thought she would never play tennis again. She was the sentimental favourite as took to the court for her first major final since that attack.

 

Knowing the story, knowing how hard Kvitova had worked to come back and how much the final meant to her, Osaka was now sorry to have ended up the winner.

 

“Honestly I didn’t want this to be our first match,” Osaka said quietly. “I’m honoured to have played you in the finals of a grand slam.”

 

Hopefully the fates will cut Osaka some slack and sooner rather than later she will find herself in a major final facing a perfectly presentable player but one who doesn’t have a tragic backstory or one who is chasing a sport-defining moment of history. Then it will all be about Naomi. Maybe then she will remember to smile when she wins.

 

But until that day comes, her coach, Sascha Bajin will keep trying to teach the rough diamond in his charge about the intricacies of the game while her fitness coach, Abdul Sillah, will keep working on her speed and strength. They both know that everything about Osaka can be improved and they both thrive on the fact that she wants to learn. It is clearly a winning combination: she is very, very good now but just think what she will be like when they have finished with her.