A thousand watch, camera, shoe, racquet, and phone commercials to the contrary, Maria Sharapova didn’t look all that cute in Linz last week. Nike wrapped her in drab purple, and her hair didn't exactly have a sheen to it. (Not that I'm criticizing her for looking like an athlete or anything.) No matter, because in winning her fifth title of 2006 and second in as many weeks, the 19-year-old showed again that what she may lack in looks, she more than makes up for in brains.
Sharapova played fellow-Russian Top Tenner Nadia Petrova in the final. There isn’t much that separates these two. Both of them use their backhands as weapons, are shaky at times with their forehands, don’t move particularly well to their right, and own two of the best serves in women’s tennis. Petrova is the smoother, more natural athlete, but Sharapova’s flat strokes are slightly more lethal; where Petrova needs to work the point to hit a winner, Sharapova can smack one from anywhere, anytime.
None of that explains Sharapova’s 7-5, 6-2 win yesterday, though. What I was impressed with was her ability to out-compete Petrova—both when she was behind and again when she was ahead—and bamboozle her tactically. Her performance included a lesson for everyone:
Set a Tone, Any Tone: Sharapova—and her father—give each match an aggressive, almost histrionic edge and force their opponent to respond to it. Right off the bat, this puts them a step ahead psychologically. In that sense, the Sharapovs are Machiavellian: boldness is paramount, and a grand show of desire and ferocity is just as important in intimidating an opponent as a solid first serve. Often it’s enough to take an opponent out of her normal approach. At key moments yesterday, Petrova was visibly hesitant in the face of Sharapova’s intensity, making uncharacteristic errors into the net and double-faulting to give away games.
While Sharapova's style is not easy on the ears—I watch her with the mute button on—she sets the pace of a match without slowing it to a crawl, à la Rafael Nadal. Unfortunately, their aggressiveness has led Yuri and Maria to use well-timed bathroom breaks for gamesmanship purposes, and to break the rules with illegal coaching. In true Prince-ly fashion, they probably won’t change how they behave until they see a tangible drawback to it. Like fewer endorsement dollars.
Proceed On a Case-by-Case Basis: After Petrova hit a winning forehand late in the second set, Sharapova went back to that side right away with two straight serves. She won both points. Smart move, because Petrova’s forehand is often erratic, and she’s unlikely to keep hitting outright winners with it.
On the other hand, in her quarterfinal with Ana Ivanovic, Sharapova stayed away from her opponent’s forehand after seeing her crack a winning return with it. The Russian served two balls to Ivanovic’s backhand, which is not as powerful as her forehand. Sharapova went on to win the game and negated any confidence her opponent may have gotten from her spectacular shot.
Ignore Momentum: I’m surprised by how seldomly the pros come back from being down game point. When it gets to 40-30, there’s a sense that momentum is on the server’s side and the game is his or hers to lose. But it takes two people to create momentum, as Sharapova showed yesterday. At the end of the first set, she came back from 15-40 at 4-5, then did it again to win the set 7-5. In the first game of the second, Petrova went up 40-15 on her serve. Rather than be content with going down 0-1 after winning the first set, Sharapova hung in, broke, and kept Petrova from getting any kind of foothold in the second set.
Punctuate the Percentages: Up a break at 4-2 in the second, Sharapova took two chances on her returns to open the game. She started with an inside-out backhand on the first point, then drilled a forehand return down the line on the second. Both worked, but from there she went back to percentage tennis to finish the game. Serving at 5-2, Sharapova opened with one of the biggest serves she had hit all day, right down the middle. After winning that point and throwing Petrova off balance, she went back to basics again, keeping the ball to her flustered opponent’s forehand and closing the match without a hitch.
The Week Ahead
Poor Paris, or Bercy as the aficionados call it. Federer, Nadal, Ljubicic, Nalbandian, Roddick, and Baghdatis have all withdrawn. The tournament is the victim of a triple misfortune: It comes at the end of the season, right after a big event (Madrid), and right before an even bigger event on another continent (Masters Cup in Shanghai). Federer and Nadal also withdrew last year, which means a scheduling change should be made. But I hope ATP chief Etienne de Villiers doesn’t use this as a way to drastically reduce the number of Masters events (he’s been talking about going from nine down to five). In general, I think they’re a success, perhaps the only one either tour has come up with in recent years. Getting the top players together on a regular basis is what makes the ATP more vibrant than the WTA. There should be a way to space, say, eight of them out on the calendar more effectively.
Let’s see, the bright side. It’s hard to find when you look at the draw and see “Gabashvili” where “Federer” was yesterday, and “Soderling” in place of “Nadal.” But we’ve still got that cool blue court, which makes me think of this as Parisian lounge tennis. And in the next few days we may see Safin-Gasquet, Tursunov-Almagro, Murray-Monfils, and Blake-Clement (yes, I’m stretching to find excitement). Here in the U.S. we also have John Barrett announcing. This morning, as Nicolas Almagro bent double and screamed at the top of his lungs after missing a sitter forehand, Barrett gently chimed in with this: “From which you’d gather he’s a little displeased.”
I’ll be back in a couple days with an update.