Simona Halep Breaks Through in French Open, Winning Her First Major Title
PARIS — Simona Halep’s racket was lying on the red clay, its redemptive work done for the day, and both of her arms were thrust high overhead as she beamed on a court that has brought her plenty of heartache.
In the stands, Darren Cahill, Halep’s normally cool and collected coach, was unsuccessfully fighting back tears. High up in the commentary booth, Chris Evert, a seven-time French Open champion, was tearing up, too, well aware of how it feels to have a Grand Slam quest come to a happy end.
Already No. 1, Halep proved on Saturday that she could win the big one, too.
After losing her first three major finals, she rallied to defeat Sloane Stephens, 3-6, 6-4, 6-1, to win the French Open and join the ranks of leading players whose perseverance paid off with a major singles title.
“I was dreaming for this moment since actually I started to play tennis,” Halep said. “It’s my favorite Grand Slam. I always said that if I’m going to win one, I want it to be here. It’s real now.”
Jana Novotna, the Czech star, also lost her first three Grand Slam singles finals before winning Wimbledon in 1998. Kim Clijsters lost her first four before winning the United States Open in 2005. Evert lost her first three before winning the French Open on this same stretch of clay in 1974.
“This lady fights her heart out,” Evert said of Halep. “She runs down balls like no other, shows emotion like no other and has had so many disappointments in majors. And now this victory wipes out the past and is so much sweeter.”
Many have offered encouragement in the past four years as Halep tried to rebound from her latest Grand Slam setback. She has questioned herself repeatedly and found a way to improve herself, enlisting the help of Cahill, one of the game’s most respected coaches. More recently, she enlisted a sports psychologist to help her maintain a better equilibrium as she coped with titles on the line and her home nation of Romania supporting her so passionately that it was only increasing the burden.
But the pressure was off on Saturday evening after the most significant victory of her career, and she is now the first Romanian woman in 40 years to win the French Open, the tournament her mentor Virginia Ruzici won in 1978.
“Simona’s been close the last couple years and has worked really hard for it and has been kicked in the stomach a couple of times when she’s had chances,” Cahill said. “They say the destination is more beautiful if it’s a bit of a bumpy road and you eventually get there, and it’s what happened to her today. And it’s a magical moment for her, and she did it the hard way against a great opponent.”
To manage it, the top-seeded Halep had to fight back to win from a set and a service break down, just as Jelena Ostapenko, her unseeded opponent in last year’s French Open final, had done against her.
In the early stages on Saturday, Halep could find no holes in Stephens’s defenses as the American glided along the baseline, calmly reading the flow of play and absorbing pace as Halep pressed for quicker solutions that were not yet available.
It was as if Halep were not only playing on crushed red brick, but also playing against a red brick wall.
But Halep did not panic, and after losing her serve in the opening game of the second set and falling behind, 0-2, she was gradually able to wrest away control of the match, forcing errors and finding new angles and opportunities as she varied the trajectories with her forehand and mixed in occasional forays to the net.
Not that this was a true all-court match. It was, above all, a full-blown baseline duel: brimming with slugfest exchanges that stretched well into double digits.
But at 0-2, Halep held serve and eventually reeled off nine straight points as she broke Stephens’s serve for the first time and at love. Later, serving at 4-4, 30-30, Halep was still on the precipice of a straight-sets defeat, but she played two bold points, taking chances and converting with forehands that allowed her to avert the danger and hold.
After breaking Stephens to even the match at one set apiece, she jumped out to a 5-0 lead in the final set before Stephens held to 5-1.
In all, Halep won 12 of the final 15 games, serving out the match at 5-1 and then dropping her racket as she faced her team in the players’ box.
“I couldn’t breathe very well in the last game at 5-0, and when I lost the game, I said, ‘O.K., I have four more until she gets back,’ ” Halep said. “So I have just to take ball by ball, point by point. Because last year, I was a little bit defensive when I was leading the match, and now I just change it in my mind.”
Stephens was 6-0 in tour-level finals until Saturday, a streak that included a straight-sets rout of Madison Keys, her American compatriot and friend, in last year’s United States Open final, where Stephens capped a remarkably speedy comeback from a foot operation.
Unlike Halep, Stephens already knew what it took to win a major final. But Halep has had a clear edge when they have played head-to-head, and has now won their last five matches.
They are both fleet and fluid baseliners of a similar age: Halep is 26; Stephens is 25. Both can counterpunch but also attack on their own when required.
Now they have even more in common.
“I think she’s had a tough journey,” said the 10th-seeded Stephens, who will rise to a career-high No. 4 in the rankings on Monday. “I’m glad she finally got her first Slam. It’s a beautiful thing, very special. No matter how hard the adversity that you go through, there is always light at the end of the tunnel, and I’m glad she finally got her light.”
Ruzici first saw Halep play when Halep was 14. She became convinced that Halep could make an impact at the professional level after she saw her win the French Open girls’ title at age 16 in 2008.
Halep reads the game beautifully and flows around the court with a rare grace, but her successful quest for a Grand Slam test also underscored her steely side.
“She’s done a very nice job of being able to put some disappointments behind her and get back to work and keep looking for improvements,” Cahill said.
She first came close to winning the French Open in 2014, losing a three-set final to Maria Sharapova. She got even closer in last year’s final against the big-hitting Ostapenko, who was just 20 years old and ranked far below Halep.
The defeat left Halep reeling, and she was beaten by Sharapova in last year’s United States Open in the first round. But she regained momentum in the final two months of the season, rising to No. 1 in the rankings for the first time.
At this year’s Australian Open, the first Grand Slam tournament of the season, she scrapped her way through the draw. She saved a total of five match points on her way to the final only to fall just short against Caroline Wozniacki, who won her first major title instead.
“Maybe the fourth time will be with luck,” Halep told the crowd at the on-court awards ceremony, shortly before checking into a Melbourne hospital with severe dehydration after the draining three-set match.
She has paid her dues and then some.
“I obviously feel very sad for her, but at the same time I’m very happy for myself,” Wozniacki said after the final in Australia. “I can only imagine how she must be feeling.”
Little more than four months later, Halep is feeling quite a bit better, and a lot of other people who follow the game closely are, too.
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "Simona Halep Breaks Through, Winning Her First French Open Title"
Post a Comment