Hodgkinson: Sharapova's Greatest Challenge
Russian looks to end Serena hoodoo Mark Hodgkinson
A tournament can be a long time in tennis; this sport can change irrevocably in the minutes it takes to complete a set or a game, even in the half-second of tossing up the ball, unloading and hearing the ‘thwack’ of an ace against the backstop.
So it's hard to process that a full decade - that's nothing less than an age in the tennis world – has now passed since the World No.2 and one of the greats of the game, Maria Sharapova, last defeated the only woman higher than her in the rankings, Serena Williams.
It was Boris Becker who once observed that so much is crammed into a season on the circuit that commentators should talk of tennis years as pet-owners do of dog years, with seven to every regular year; if we follow that suggestion then we're up to 70 since Sharapova last smiled during a post-match handshake with Williams. Even sticking to the standard way of measuring the passage of time, a decade is an extraordinarily long period for one alpha female to go without beating another, especially for someone as relentlessly competitive and ambitious as Sharapova.
This month's BNP Paribas WTA Finals Singapore presented by SC Global brings up the 10-year anniversary. Occasion, then, to consider everything that has happened in the tennis lives of those two women, and across the sport, since Sharapova's victory over Williams at the 2004 season-ending championships in Los Angeles.
Take Sharapova, who earlier that season, at the age of just 17 years, had beaten Williams in the Wimbledon final to score her first major title (that was her only other victory over Williams); she has since scored trophies at the US Open, the Australian Open and French Open to put herself in that elite group of women to have achieved the Career Grand Slam. Why, she's even reinvented herself as a force on the clay, with two titles on the clay of Roland Garros, the second of which came at this year's tournament. Who would have thought, back in 2004, that she would have such success in Paris? Sharapova, for one, wouldn’t have been among that group. In so many ways – including holding the World No.1 ranking – this has been a fine decade for Sharapova, a golden decade even.
Off the court, she has established herself as the world's highest earning female athlete. And yet, for all her other accomplishments, what has been beyond her is beating Williams (while other less celebrated players have had their victories against the American).
Fifteen times Sharapova and Williams have played since that 2004 season finale in California, and on every occasion it was Williams who triumphed, with two of those matches coming this year, in the Brisbane semifinals and at the same stage of the Miami tournament. How can you possibly describe this as a rivalry, Sharapova has said, when she hasn't beaten Williams in 10 years? "Maria is the one who says that you can't talk about rivalries until she wins one - and she says that with a chuckle," Tracy Austin told wtafinals.com. "Even so, if there were two players I would want to see competing in a big final, it would be those two."
Many would agree with Austin on that. For this is a match-up that, despite the American's dominance with a 16-2 lead in their head-to-head record, demands your attention. Their matches are not to be missed. And, as Chris Evert told wtafinals.com, there's no reason for Sharapova to feel extra pressure the next time she encounters Williams. Quite the opposite – she should feel free on court. "Maria should just go out nice and free and easy, with the pressure almost all on Serena," said Evert, an ambassador for the BNP Paribas WTA Finals Singapore. "I don't think that Maria has anything to lose against Serena now. And I don't think that it's become a mental thing for Maria – I've seen Maria play some great sets against Serena."
If Sharapova is simply too fierce to let a decade-long run of defeats affect here, then how can we explain Williams’ superiority? Evert's analysis is that Williams' movement has been key. "I think Serena's game is always going to give Maria trouble because of movement. Serena can run down a lot of Maria's balls. So Maria has to hit three or four more if she's going to win the point. Serena can run down Maria's power. However, Maria can't run down Serena's power so easily," Evert said. "With Serena and Maria, it’s about their movement and their serves, and Serena has come out on top in both those areas."
It’s Williams’ physical power, Austin said, that has enabled her to consistently beat Sharapova. "The reason Maria hasn't beaten Serena in 10 years is Serena's athleticism and speed. Serena's so fast about the court, and she hits the ball so hard,” said Austin, who will be competing in the WTA Legends Event at the Singapore Sports Hub.
Don't expect any pessimism from Sharapova ahead of her next meeting with Williams. There's nothing that Sharapova likes more than a challenge, and there's no greater challenge in her professional life than trying to overcome an adversary who some regard as the greatest female tennis player of all time. "Despite my results against her, I still look forward to playing against her because you learn so much from the level of tennis she produces," Sharapova has said.
"You finish the match and you know where you need to improve and the things you need to work on. Someone like Serena, who is so powerful and explosive, and who's in there every point, that teaches you to make sure you're in there every point and you're doing your thing consistently, and not just for a short period of time. There's no reason for me to feel any extra pressure because of my results against her. That's the reason she's at the top. She has accomplished a lot, her tennis speaks for itself, and I have nothing to lose against her."
It's not as if Sharapova doesn't create her opportunities against Williams; on that last meeting, on the cement of Florida, she led 4-1 in the opening set before losing the match in straight sets. "I have tremendous respect for the way that Maria has gone about her career. There's always total engagement from first round to last. And from first point to last," observed Austin, who said of recent encounters between Sharapova and Williams: "Maria has pushed Serena in the last year or so."
How much further can Sharapova push her? Will Williams' unbroken period of dominance soon come to an end? “It’s no secret,” Sharapova has said, “that Serena is an opponent I would love to beat.”
Mark Hodgkinson is a tennis writer based in London. His new book, 'Game, Set and Match', will be published by Bloomsbury in 2015.
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