by Pete Bodo
MIAMI—She walked out on the court enveloped in an aura of invincibility, in a sleek, white, long-sleeved top and electric blue shorts, a colt-ish champion holding her head high and riding a 26-match winning streak in which the last episode was a remarkable comeback from 6-1, 5-1 down—the kind of resurrection that usually leaves a player surfing a wave of emotion and self-assurance to the trophy presentation.
But the unstoppable force known as Victoria Azarenka ran into an immovable object in Marion Bartoli here in the quarterfinals of the Sony Ericsson Open, and when it ended, she stole out of the stadium with her head bowed, legs weary, her aura dimmed and dreams of a perfect record on the early hard-court season shattered.
“Physically I was just not able to do anything today,” Azarenka said afterward, failing to do justice to a match of very high quality. “It was just not possible. You know, I'm a human, not a super woman, and I wish I could be but I'm not. . . But, you know, Marion really played really well today, and she deserves the win. What else can I say? I have to look forward.”
Azarenka did not run out of steam, spray balls all over the court, choke, or otherwise enable this resonant upset—at least not until near the end, when she took her sweet time preparing for the points, often standing stock still with a faintly beleaguered expression on her face. At times in the last few games, Madame Whooooo didn’t even bother to utter that distinctive war cry, punctuating her effort instead with a simple, workmanlike grunt of fatigue.
But by then the outcome of this episode was determined and, perhaps, implicitly understood. Bartoli had grabbed this match and wouldn’t let go, ripping it out of Azarenka’s hands in a flurry of furious two-handed forehands and backhands, punishing, pre-emptive bullet-like blasts that so impressed the Miami crowd that by the end they were right there with her, emotionally dragging her to the finish line.
Bartoli hit 27 winners to Azarenka's 16, but this was a night on which either woman’s presumed winner turned into her rival’s vicious counter-punch. The key, in Bartoli’s own estimation, was the deadly combination of her resolve and a style of play that is rooted in her childhood, when she frequently played on a court with very little room behind the baseline. This, she said, trained her from an early age to play from on or inside the baseline.
That Azarenka’s success this year has been predicated on the same strategy helps explain why both women so often held their own in numerous warp-speed rallies.
“It was almost table tennis sometimes,” Bartoli said, wearing the ironic smile of a masochist. “You know, I would just stay into my baseline and block it. It was playing so fast. . . Against Vika you have to really stay close to your baseline. If you let some inches to her and give her some courts to walk on, she's really stepping up inside the court and you have to run so many miles.”
Bartoli had been lurking by the wayside, waiting for this ambush opportunity for some time. Azarenka led the head-to-head 8-2 before tonight, but Bartoli was convinced that she had blown a few chances to improve on that by failing to play an entire match with sufficient aggression.
Two memories haunted her, the most recent of them earlier this year in Sydney, where she led Azarenka 5-2 in the first set and 4-1 in the second, but lost the match. A similar event happened at Stanford, in 2010. She was determined not to allow it to happen again.
“I think the main key for me was the belief and really to step up on the court trying to win the match, not only thinking about how well she's playing and everything, but really go on the court, having a game plan and try to go for my shots.”
As Azarenka noted, “She was on everything. I felt like everything was coming back much faster than I was hitting, and everything was hitting over the line or, you know, a clean winner.”
Bartoli’s aplomb was never more evident than when she endured a potential game-changing period of frustration at 6-3, 2-1, on serve. Bartoli was broken in the next game, a long, exhausting game during which Azarenka punished her brutally and repeatedly in long, cross-court rallies. But Bartoli went right back at Azarenka in the next game. She pinned down Azarenka 0-40 with savage ball striking in the next game and went on to break at 15, after which she held. She didn’t lose another game.
The most notable thing about all this, though, is that like Dominika Cibulkova one round earlier, Bartoli wouldn’t give an inch even though Azarenka, the defending champ and top seed, played at the expected, high level.
Azareka took that fact for business as usual. "No, I'm not surprised, because both of those players came out and played probably the best tennis of their lives. You know, it's expected, as I said. Anybody who would go play a No. 1 player in the world would be highly motivated, especially with me not losing a match. Everybody wanted to be the first one to beat me, you know, probably.”
That may be true, but WTA history, right up the the present, has been littered with 6-0, 6-2 blowouts delivered by dominant No. 1 players in the rounds leading up to the final—especially when, like Azarenka here, they were defending champions playing on their surface of choice. There’s a bigger picture here, and it has to do with the gradual increase in the number of confident, aggressive, gifted players emerging on tour.
This is the answered prayer for the WTA, which for so long has been plagued by the inability of challengers to adequately answer the call when a player goes on a tear comparable to Azarenka’s streak.
Or put it this way: Bartoli did what no ATP counterpart could at this time last year, when Novak Djokovic was riding herd on the men’s tour. And keep in mind that Bartoli isn't exactly Rafael Nadal to Azarenka's Djokovic.
It’s too early to say, but the final piece that an otherwise flourishing women’s game has been seeking since its inception may be falling into place.