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Tennis: Belgian pair reach final, putting an end to surprises
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Christopher Clarey IHT
Friday, January 30, 2004
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MELBOURNE The Melburnians who snapped up their tickets months ago for the Australian Open women's semifinals must have liked their chances of seeing the Belgians Justine Henin-Hardenne and Kim Clijsters in action. The surprise came from the opposition. There was not a Willliams sister, a Jennifer Capriati or Amelie Mauresmo in sight on Thursday; not even a rising Russian with a wicked forehand or a modeling contract.
Instead, the women blocking the Belgians' by-now-customary path to a Grand Slam singles final were Fabiola Zuluaga of Colombia and Patty Schnyder of Switzerland, neither of whom had reached this knee-knocking phase of a major event before.
But the surprises ended there, and it was no shock that they ended in a relative hurry.
Though the 32nd-seeded Zuluaga played aggressively and conducted herself respectably - minding her manners despite two rotten line calls against her early in the first set - she never posed a serious threat to the No. 1 seeded Henin-Hardenne, losing 6-2, 6-2.
Though the 22nd-seeded Schnyder has a languid, left-handed game that can cause top players occasional fits, she was only able to trouble the inconsistent Clijsters in the second set of their semifinal, serving unsuccessfully for it at 5-4 before losing the match in a lopsided tiebreaker 6-2, 7-6 (7-2).
It takes time and return visits to get accustomed to the thin air on top of the tennis mountain. The sun seems brighter there; the heart beats a bit faster. Pasts get dredged up, strangers greet you, acquaintances aim for friendship. And all that interest can add just enough extra weight to a serve or a groundstroke to send it flying smack into the tape.
But Henin-Hardenne and Clijsters, who is ranked No. 2, are experienced climbers now. The final Saturday will be the third all-Belgian affair in the last four Grand Slam tournaments.
Henin-Hardenne has won them all, beating Clijsters convincingly in the French Open and U.S. Open finals. But Clijsters holds a 9-8 lead overall and won their most recent match, in Filderstadt, Germany, last autumn.
This final will determine not only who becomes Belgium's first Australian Open champion, but also who leaves Melbourne with the No. 1 ranking.
"Maybe people get used to it now, and it's normal that we are in the final," Henin-Hardenne said. "But for myself, the feeling is still as great as it was for the first time."
It is indeed remarkable that a small European country with no history of producing Grand Slam singles champions could produce the world's two finest players in a global sport. Their performance here would have been more remarkable still if the competition had been up to the challenge. But though both Henin-Hardenne and Clijsters have been erratic, and Clijsters has been unable to practice normally because of a tender left ankle, neither lost a set on the road to the final.
That is no compliment to the depth of the women's game, and it explains why there were the now-customary questions on Wednesday about whether it wasn't high time that the Williams sisters return to the tour and top form to make all this more interesting.
"Everybody's going to be happy when they come back, but to be honest, that's not my problem right now," said Henin-Hardenne, feeling obliged to point out that Venus had actually played in this tournament and lost in the third round.
"Venus came back here, but it's not easy after six months off to be at your best level; it takes a little bit of time," Henin-Hardenne said. "We just try to make this a very high level of competition. We do our best for it, and I think that we could see very good matches in this tournament again."
At least there is the potential for a very good one on Saturday. Henin-Hardenne looks fitter; Clijsters, who has yet to win a Grand Slam singles title, should be hungrier and will have the crowd on her side: after all, she is the fiancée of the Australian player Lleyton Hewitt.
Clijsters attributes her failures in last year's final to overloading her schedule and playing doubles in the majors - the latter a pleasure that she has forsaken. "I was just exhausted at the end of the tournament, and that's something that I've learned," she said.
She has had more time to rest than she would like this month, because of the injury to her left ankle that forced her to withdraw from the Sydney event. Though she had concerns about it during her quarterfinal against Anastasia Myskina and appears to have put on weight in the legs since last season, she appeared as quick as usual against Schnyder.
"It's not going to get any better than what it's been," Clijsters said. "I'll need to sit down and think about it after the Australian Open and think about what the doctors are saying. But I can't make it any worse, so that's the good news."
The bad news for Clijsters and all the other injured women is that Henin-Hardenne, for the moment, has no need to think about what doctors are saying.
International Herald Tribune
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