It takes grit for a tennis player at any level to bounce back quickly from losing 6-0, 6-0.
Consider Sofia Kenin gritty.
Kenin, the newest Grand Slam singles champion from the United States, got double bageled in Rome by Victoria Azarenka last month, but Kenin, not Azarenka, is in the fourth round of the French Open.
And Kenin was certainly doing the math in her head on Saturday, when she rallied after an edgy start to reel off 12 straight games in her 6-2, 6-0 victory over Irina Bara, a qualifier from Romania.
“Winning basically 12-love is obviously nice after what happened,” Kenin said with a laugh when we spoke. “Look, in Rome, Vika played really well, I’m not going to take anything away, but I had to move on. I knew the French was coming and it was more important for me to do well in the French than in Rome. Obviously, I want to do well in all tournaments, but if I had to pick, for sure Paris.”
Paris was good to her last year, when she made her first big wave in a major by upsetting Serena Williams in the third round on Philippe Chatrier Court before losing to Ashleigh Barty, the eventual champion.
Now Kenin is back in the fourth round while Barty is back home in Australia sitting out the rest of the 2020 season because of travel concerns during the coronavirus pandemic.
But there are plenty of other threats left in the women’s draw, including Kenin’s next opponent. Fiona Ferro is unseeded, but she is at home in France and on red clay. Ferro, a great mover who slides with grace and rips her heavy forehand with ease, won the tour’s first event after its five-month hiatus: a clay-court tournament in Palermo, Italy.
On Saturday, Ferro showed plenty of grit of her own to wear down Patricia Tig and win 7-6 (7), 4-6, 6-0.
The French crowd, limited to 1,000 paid spectators per day by the French health authorities, still managed to generate plenty of noise and even a few boos when the feisty Tig started celebrating after Ferro’s errors in the grueling opening set.
The jeers, like the cheers, were refreshing after so many months of silence at tournaments like the United States Open, which was held without fans.
Kenin, like many of her peers, has already had enough of the “bubble life.”
“I feel like all of us don’t like it for sure,” she said. “We all want to go out, but we can’t go out, because if you go out, you are disqualified and no one wants that of course. I know what to expect now with the mask and the social distancing and no crowds. But honestly, I feel like this is something I can never get used to, because this is completely not normal, and I obviously want it to be back to normal how it used to be. I miss the fans, really miss the fans.”
She also has missed a certain window of opportunity after winning her first Grand Slam singles title at the Australian Open in early February, only to see sports shut down worldwide for months afterward.
“It was quite devastating, obviously it wasn’t the best thing that happened, but this was the case for everybody and it just happened to be after I won,” Kenin said. “It is what it is. I try not to be so down, and just tried to keep myself motivated for once things would happen again.”
Her unexpected run in Australia was brilliant and often bold, including a win over the American teenager Coco Gauff, who has, fairly or not, seen a much bigger spotlight than Kenin for those interested in emerging American tennis stars.
Above all, Kenin came up with the goods in the third set of the final against Garbiñe Muguruza. Down 0-40 on her serve at 2-all, Kenin won five straight points: four with groundstroke winners and one with an ace to hold serve and then close out the victory.
It was one of the great games in Grand Slam history, but it seems like ancient history at this stage with the pandemic rendering sports an afterthought. Sponsorship deals for new arrivals like Kenin have become more difficult to secure and tournament appearance fees were wiped out during the hiatus.
“Definitely tough timing for her,” said John Tobias, a leading tennis agent who is executive vice president of GSE Worldwide. “But she is talented and consistent enough that it’s likely she will regain the commercial momentum she had earlier in the year. She’s the No. 1 American, top five in the world, 21 years old and marketable. That checks a lot of boxes for brands and tournaments.”
Women’s tennis has often felt like roulette in recent years. There have been eight first-time major singles champions in the past 13 Grand Slam tournaments. Though Naomi Osaka has managed to win three major titles, other new arrivals have fallen back through slumps or injuries, including Sloane Stephens, Jelena Ostapenko and Bianca Andreescu.
Will Kenin, 21, have more staying power? She certainly has the competitive drive as well as a perfectionist streak.
In Paris, she has sometimes looked as dissatisfied with her winners as with her errors. There have been plenty of both. She went three sets in her first two rounds against unseeded opponents.
“Obviously, I feel like I should get deep in a tournament,” Kenin said. “I’m a bit hard on myself.”
But as she has proved since her junior days, she has an uncommon ability to reboot and briskly move on to the next point. Despite appearances, she has been enjoying herself on court: never more than when she can take back her racket with both hands for a backhand and bamboozle an opponent with a perfectly disguised drop shot.
In this year’s heavy autumnal conditions, her signature shot is all the rage at Roland Garros, and she hit winners aplenty with it on Saturday.
What happened in Rome seems to have stayed in Rome, and playing doubles with the upbeat veteran, Bethanie Mattek-Sands, seems to have helped her mood, too. But Kenin still needs to find surer footing and a higher gear on a slippery surface if she wants to become a multiple Grand Slam champion.
“Believe it or not, I used to really hate clay,” she said. “But I learned to like it last year here, and I still do.”
Karen Crouse contributed reporting.
Source: Tennis - nytimes.com
