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    Ons Jabeur Calls Wimbledon Loss ‘the Most Painful’ of Her Career

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    “Honestly, I felt a lot of pressure, feeling a lot of stress,” Jabeur said after losing the women’s singles final to Marketa Vondrousova.With the hopes of a country, a continent and a world of tennis lovers who felt she was long overdue urging her toward history, Ons Jabeur fell agonizingly short. For the second time at Wimbledon, and the third time in a year at a Grand Slam, Jabeur had hoped to become the first woman from Tunisia, the first from Africa and the first Arabic speaker to win a major women’s singles tournament.The pressure of playing for so much and so many may have caught up to her, again.“Honestly, I felt a lot of pressure, feeling a lot of stress,” Jabeur said Saturday after losing the women’s singles final, 6-4, 6-4 to Marketa Vondrousova. “But like every final, like every match I played, I was telling myself, ‘It’s OK, it’s normal.’ I honestly did nothing wrong.”For years on tour, Jabeur has done everything right, except win a title that she and her fans so desperately desire. Tears flowed again on Centre Court, as Jabeur joined the likes of Andy Murray and Jana Novotna, two former Wimbledon finalists who each cried after losing finals they had hoped would be their breakthrough championships.Jabeur, who lost last year’s Wimbledon final — and the final of the last U.S. Open — struggled against Vondrousova, who won to become the first unseeded Wimbledon women’s champion.Shortly after, during the on-court ceremony, Jabeur broke down, wiping tears from her pink eyes as she spoke to spectators, and holding the runner-up trophy like a dirty dish. She called it “the most painful loss” of her career. Then, when she receded into the elegant hallways of Wimbledon’s main stadium, Catherine, Princess of Wales, offered a consoling hug.“I told her hugs are always welcome from me,” said Jabeur, who required the same sympathetic shoulder last year after losing to Elena Rybakina in the final.Another famous royal hug was given in 1993 by the Duchess of Kent to Novotna, after Novotna had lost to Steffi Graf in the final and began to weep during the trophy ceremony. Five years later, Novotna won it all.In 2012, Murray was in pieces after losing to Roger Federer in the final, barely able to speak to the fans — and to a nation — during his on-court speech. Carrying the hopes of British sports fans yearning for their first men’s champion in 77 years at their home grand slam, Murray’s voice cracked and he dabbed his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. A few weeks later he won the U.S. Open and the following year he won Wimbledon, by beating Novak Djokovic, this year’s men’s finalist who plays on Sunday against Carlos Alcaraz.There is precedent, and perhaps some luck, for popular players who demonstrate their vulnerability and shed a tear after a gutting loss. Jabeur also received a hug from Kim Clijsters, who lost four finals in major tournaments before finally winning the U.S. Open in 2005. She eventually finished her career with four Grand Slam singles titles, one for every loss.“It brings back a lot of memories and thoughts about how you go about it,” Clijsters said in an interview Saturday after the match. “I was trying to remember the process I went through. There is no real secret, it’s just trying to give yourself the opportunity to get to that stage again.”At the 2001 French Open, Clijsters sought to become the first Belgian woman to win a major tournament. She lost to Jennifer Capriati, 12-10, in an epic third set, one day after her 18th birthday. Clijsters said she was too young to handle all the attention, scrutiny and on-court challenges if she had won that day.Jabeur showed flashes of resilience early in the second set against Vondrousova, but could not make the most of it.Andrew Couldridge/ReutersJabeur, who turns 29 in August, feels more than ready to win. But the pressure only increases with each failed attempt. Clijsters noticed that Jabeur had poor body language Saturday, slumping after mistakes and showing zero positive emotions following a good shot.“That shows that the doubt was overpowering everything during the match,” Clijsters said. “The biggest thing she has to learn is to fake it. Fake it until you make it.”Faking it could be hard for Jabeur, who appears as genuine as she is talented; one of the many reasons fans are so drawn to her. As the No. 6 seed, she played magnificently here, avenging last year’s devastating loss to No. 3 Rybakina in a quarterfinal and No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka in their semifinal. Many thought it was Jabeur’s time, making the loss more excruciating and eliciting sympathy even from Vondrousova’s camp.“When I saw her, I started to cry, too,” said Stepan Simek, Vondrousova’s husband. “Ons is a very lovely human. She has a good heart and is very friendly with opponents, and even to me. I was very sad because she deserves to be a Grand Slam champion. She will make it one day.” More

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      French Open Champion Krejcikova Thanks Her Mentor, Novotna

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      Barbora Krejcikova developed her multifaceted game with the help of the former Wimbledon champion Jana Novotna, who died in 2017.PARIS — Hand pointing to the sky, the new French Open champion Barbora Krejcikova gave credit where she knew it was due on Saturday.“I hope she’s happy,” Krejcikova said of Jana Novotna, the former Wimbledon champion who died of cancer in November 2017.In Krejcikova’s view, all of “this” — the surprise run to a Roland Garros title — would not have happened without Novotna’s influence on her career at a critical phase: the transition from juniors to the much more selective professional game.It was good fortune that Novotna was from Brno: the same Czech city as Krejcikova. But Krejcikova and her family made their own luck, too. She showed up with her parents at Novotna’s home in 2014 with a letter of introduction and a desire to find a tennis mentor who understood both the micro and macro of what it took to become great.The visit was her mother’s idea, but Krejcikova, then 18 and recovering from a recent illness, made her own case, and Novotna, to her surprise, was receptive.“She was just very nice, very warm,” Krejcikova said on Saturday. “She told me: ‘I have a court on Thursday in this club at this time. If you want to come, you can come. We can look at you, have a hit. We’re just going to see what’s going to come.’”Krejcikova told her that she had been ill.“Jana was like, ‘It doesn’t matter,’” Krejcikova said. “‘If you cannot hit, we can talk.’”Novotna training with Krejcikova in Prague in 2016.Pavel Lebeda/CTK, via Associated PressNovotna agreed to not only counsel her but also coach her and follow her on the circuit. Novotna’s contacts as a longtime leading player meant that Krejcikova had access to some quality hitting partners.“We were playing the legends tournament here at Roland Garros a few years ago, and Jana said, ‘Come hit with this girl I’m coaching,’” Martina Navratilova said on Saturday. “And I thought Barbora had good talent, but you still never think that it’s going to lead to something like this. She didn’t have any obvious weapons, but her brain is her big weapon. She has got the good hands. She has got the variety and then the brain to know when to use it.”Novotna, who died at 49, had variety and a sharp mind, too. She was a graceful mover with a one-handed backhand, committed to attacking the net behind chipped approach shots and then hitting angled volleys and overheads. It was a high-risk, eye-catching game and, like Krejcikova, she excelled in doubles, but her nerves betrayed her in her biggest singles matches through much of her career.In the moment that long defined her, she cracked and lost a big third-set lead in the 1993 Wimbledon to Steffi Graf. There should have been no shame in losing to Graf on any surface, but Novotna knew she had not done her own talent justice, and ended up crying on the Duchess of Kent’s shoulder during the trophy ceremony on Centre Court.Novotna had a happier ending at Wimbledon when she won the singles title in 1998 and accepted the champion’s trophy from the Duchess of Kent. It was Novotna’s only Grand Slam singles title, and it came at age 30 in her 45th Grand Slam singles appearance.Krejcikova took a different path. Though she is 25, she has had most of her success in doubles and may have more when she plays for the French Open women’s doubles title on Sunday with her partner Katerina Siniakova.But this was only her fifth Grand Slam singles tournament, and she handled the inevitable pressure with aplomb, saving five set points in the opening set of her straight-set victory over the 17-year-old American Coco Gauff in the quarterfinals and then saving a match point against Maria Sakkari in the semifinals before fighting through the momentum shifts of a three-set final against Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova on Saturday.“I think Jana, who is well known for the emotional breakdown against Steffi and then winning Wimbledon, would have just been so impressed by Barbora’s composure,” said Rennae Stubbs, the former No. 1 doubles player who knew Novotna well and was another of Krejcikova’s early practice partners on tour. “Throughout the entire tournament, she just never looked stressed, and to be able to do that under these circumstances for somebody who had never gone through something this monumental is pretty extraordinary to be honest.”“I was a little bit panicking; I really wanted to win,” Krejcikova said. “On the other hand, I knew that if I really want to win, I’m just going to put so much pressure on myself that it’s not going to happen.”Benoit Tessier/ReutersThere were rare moments of agitation, including one shout to her player box during Saturday’s final, but Stubbs is correct that Krejcikova’s calm, focused demeanor was the rule at Roland Garros. Her pacing and breathing between points were measured; her gaze quickly went back to her strings or the clay after a point was completed. But she also showed touching flashes of humanity: applauding Gauff’s and Sakkari’s winners at critical phases of both matches.Her march to the final was nowhere near as smooth as it often looked. She felt overwhelmed before playing the American Sloane Stephens in the fourth round, crying before taking the court and speaking with her sports psychologist. She consulted her again before her victory over Sakkari and victory over Pavlyuchenkova. It was all new territory for Krejcikova, who had not been past the fourth round of a major tournament in singles before.“I was a little bit panicking; I really wanted to win,” she said. “On the other hand, I knew that if I really want to win, I’m just going to put so much pressure on myself that it’s not going to happen. We had the conversation about this. She just told me just to go and enjoy. We spoke about how to talk to myself, what to do when I’m going to feel nervous on court, just be happy that I’m actually there, all of this. That I’m already in the finals, it’s a big achievement that nobody really expected, not even me. I didn’t expect it as well.”What also helped was her experience in doubles. She and Siniakova also won their first Grand Slam final together, taking the title at the French Open in 2018 on the same center court where she won on Saturday.Krejcikova thanked Novotna after that victory, too, and on Saturday she reached a much bigger audience with the same message and the same hand pointed to the sky. This time, she received the champion’s trophy from Navratilova, who grew up in the Czech Republic before emigrating to the United States and was close with Novotna.Navratilova has shaped champions’ careers, too. It was at her suggestion that the future No. 1 Maria Sharapova, whom she had spotted at a Moscow clinic, moved to Florida with her father, Yuri, to pursue a tennis career. “It’s a small world, and you will touch many people along the way,” Navratilova said. But she also knows how long the odds are and how many prodigies, even with the right advice, do not make the transition to the highest level.She had agreed two months ago to present the trophy. She said she began watching the singles draw more and more closely as Krejcikova progressed.“I started thinking, Oh, my God, she could get to the final — and then it was, She could win the thing,” Navratilova said with a laugh. “I didn’t tell Barbora. She didn’t know I was doing the ceremony.”Predestined? Navratilova is not so certain, but she, like so many on Saturday, experienced a full-circle feeling as well as mixed emotions.“It was a beautiful victory,” Navratilova said. “But I really so wish that Jana could have been here to see it.” More

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      In French Open, Women's Singles Finals Take Surprising Shape

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      The unseeded Barbora Krejcikova has advanced to face Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, the No. 31 seed, in the singles final of the French Open.PARIS — The 2021 French Open will be remembered for its endless surprises. Stars withdrew. Top players lost early.The trend continued Thursday as two long shots surged into the women’s championship match. Elite women’s tennis has been without clear and consistent winners for a while now, but a final between Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova of Russia and Barbora Krejcikova of the Czech Republic was a scenario no one would have predicted.Pavlyuchenkova, seeded 31st, defeated the unseeded Tamara Zidansek of Slovenia, 7-5, 6-3, in the semifinals. Krejcikova, also unseeded, upset the No. 17 seed, Maria Sakkari of Greece, 7-5, 4-6, 9-7, in a match with wild momentum swings and match points on both sides of the net, even one that involved an overturned line call.Pavlyuchenkova, 29, is a veteran, having turned professional in 2005. Krejcikova, 25, is more of a late bloomer, having arrived in 2014. But neither had reached a Grand Slam semifinal before, and it showed as they triumphed despite multiple lost service games in nearly every set and more errors than most players could survive. Yet the effort was enough for each of them, if only barely.“I always wanted to play a match like this,” Krejcikova said through tears when her 3-hour, 18-minute match was finished. “Even if I lost today, I would be very proud of myself, just fighting. In here and also in life, fighting is the most important thing.”There have been just two multiple Grand Slam women’s singles winners in the past four years, the opposite of what has happened in an absurdly top-heavy men’s game, which has been dominated for so long by three of the all-time greats.Women’s tennis more closely resembles golf. At the beginning of a Grand Slam event, dozens of women seemingly have a shot to play deep into the tournament.“There is so much depth,” Tom Hill, Sakkari’s coach, said ahead of the semifinal. “Now it’s first round, second round, you’re playing against top players that can play.”Of the two finalists, Krejcikova is the bigger surprise. Her game is filled with off-speed forehands and sliced backhands. Her service returns tend to be looping backhands. She usually displays limited power and an approach that seems completely out of step with the smash-mouth style that so many women bring to the court today.In Sakkari, Krejcikova faced a gym rat who has worked with a fitness trainer since she was 14 and who prepares for tennis like a world-class sprinter. Sakkari, 25, loves being in the weight room nearly as much as she enjoys being on the tennis court. Heard that old saw about her muscles having muscles? That is Sakkari.Musculature, though, does not win tennis tournaments. Deft shotmaking and surprise can often overcome power.Sakkari struggled with prosperity all afternoon, coughing up an early lead in the first set, then barely surviving the second one after leading by 4-0. But as Sakkari was drawing even and rallying the crowd behind her, Krejcikova headed for a bathroom break that lasted several minutes longer than the usual in-match pit stop. Sakkari took the court alone and complained to the umpire to get things moving or perhaps issue a warning.Sakkari’s power was no match for Krejcikova’s deft shot-making.Christophe Archambault/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesWhen play resumed, Sakkari once more took an early lead with a service break, and had match point with Krejcikova serving at 3-5. Krejcikova saved it with a swinging backhand volley, then broke Sakkari’s serve in the next game, forcing her to make a series of errors on long rallies packed with Krejcikova’s deep, lob-like backhands.After nearly three hours, Krejcikova had figured out the winning formula. It took six more games — as Sakkari saved four match points but could not stop over-hitting, making 27 errors in the final set — for the result to become official.On the court after the match, Krejcikova thanked Jana Novotna, a Czech compatriot who struggled for years to win a Grand Slam championship until she finally claimed the Wimbledon title in 1998. When Krejcikova was a teenager, she and her parents asked Novotna for help breaking into tennis. Novotna gave it. She died of cancer in 2017 at 49.“She is watching over me,” Krejcikova said.In the other semifinal, Pavlyuchenkova ended years of frustration. She had come up short in six Grand Slam quarterfinals before prevailing on Thursday in Paris.Pavlyuchenkova provided few hints in recent months that a run of this sort was in the offing. She made the semifinal in Madrid last month but had little else to brag about. She lasted barely an hour at the Australian Open, losing badly to Naomi Osaka, the eventual champion, in the first round.But in her first Grand Slam semifinal, Pavlyuchenkova had the good fortune to face a player ranked 86th in the world.Pavlyuchenkova was hardly in control: She lost her serve twice in the first set, and twice more in the second. But she was far better than Zidansek, a 23-year-old whose inexperience and nerves showed as she lost her serve six times and committed 33 unforced errors compared with 22 for Pavlyuchenkova. Zidansek double-faulted into the middle of the net on set point, and sent a shot she easily could have put away a foot wide on match point.Zidansek had come back from a set down three times during the tournament, and twice won third sets in the equivalent of tennis overtime (9-7 and 8-6) but could not muster the same resilience against Pavlyuchenkova.Pavlyuchenkova was asked Thursday what her younger self might say now that she had finally reached the ultimate match.“What took you so long?” she said.“It’s been a long road,” she continued. “I had my own long special road. Everybody has different ways.” More