Victories on Character: How Djokovic and Kenin Win Australian Open

Useful workout with Safin

Novak Djokovic for the eighth time became the winner of the Australian Open. In the final, he beat Dominic Tim, thus becoming a 17-time triumph of the Grand Slam tournaments. The Serbian tennis player at the same time regained the status of the first racket of the world and became the third tennis player after Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer, who won eight titles in one major.

Before the final game, it became known that the champion cup will be awarded to the winner by Marat Safin, who himself won it in 2005. Perhaps, for the sake of good luck, it was with the Russian Djokovic who did the training in the morning before meeting with Tim. By the way, Safin is one of the rare players that the Serb did not manage to beat during his career, although they converged on the same court twice.

Djokovic was really lucky at first - he led early with a break in the first set and took a lot of strength from Tim while he tried to equalize. The Austrian achieved his goal, but immediately gave the serve again, after which the Serb led the sets. Only in two cases out of 68 did he suffer defeat after such a start.

The second set was very different from the first. Tim became very dangerous at the reception and on the third attempt made a break, having led with the score 3: 1. Djokovic had to catch up, in which he quickly succeeded. But in the ninth game, the Serbian tennis player was punished for delaying the time when serving. He was deprived of his first attempt and just at that moment flinch. Tim easily made a break and successfully filed for the set. The Austrian did not stop there - he won four more games, after which he led in batches. For the first time since the 2014 US Open, a player who did not win the Grand Slam was so close to the title.

But in the fourth set, Djokovic returned. He led 30-0 in the ninth game and waited for a double error from Tim, after which he easily made a break and filed for the game. The initiative returned to the reigning Australian Open champion, who embodied it in three consecutive games of the fifth set. Although there were no failures or some sort of sagging component in Tim’s game, Djokovic was simply stronger and more powerful than him. Since the beginning of the season, the Serbian tennis player has won the 13th match in a row and remained unbeaten in the finals of the Australian Open, taking the trophy from the hands of Safin. For the past 15 years, Djokovic has been winning at least one tournament per season.

The king has returned 👑

After almost four hours, @DjokerNole def. Dominic Thiem 6-4 4-6 2-6 6-3 6-4 to claim his eighth Australian Open crown. # AO2020 | # AusOpenpic.twitter.com / EJOKBy040s

Willful victory Kenin

For the first time in history, the Australian-born tennis player won the Australian Open. True, she does not represent Russia, but the United States, where she will be the first racket of the country next week. We are talking about the 21-year-old Sofya Kenin, who defeated the two-time Grand Slam winner Garbinier Mugurusu from Spain in three sets of the finals.

For two tennis players, this was only the second meeting on the court after the victory for Kenin at the last year’s tournament in Beijing. Unlike that game, the American athlete failed to start from the set won. Mugurus spent a lot of effort to make a break in the third game, after which Kenin heroically recouped from 0:40 in the seventh and evened the score. But the Spaniard made another jerk, and the first batch was left to her.

In the second set, Kenin played flawlessly - she almost completely eliminated mistakes from her game, giving her opponent only four points. The American led early with a break and did not miss her advantage until the score was 6: 2.

In the third installment, Mugurus never found a answer. After four games played, she led with a score of 40: on someone else's serve, but Kenin immediately responded with three strong shots from the back line, an ace and another actively won rally. After that, the Spaniard no longer resisted, and faster to bring Kenin closer to her first title in the majors, her own mistakes helped - all Mugurus in the last set gave the opponent as many as 17 points.

Kenin became the youngest Australian Open winner since the triumph of Maria Sharapova in 2008. Also, over the past three years, she has become the fourth tennis player to win a major without reaching at least the quarterfinals at any previous one. On top of that, Kenin will rise to seventh place in the WTA ranking, although previously her 12th position was her best.

“First of all, I want to congratulate and thank Garbinier. I would like you and I to play in the finals more than once. My dream came true. This is a very emotional moment. The last two weeks have been the best in my life. I congratulate the dad, with whom we worked so hard to achieve success, and my mother, who very far, overseas, watched this match, ”Kenin said after the victory.

Maiden Slam Moment! @SofiaKenin captures her first Grand Slam title in a fearless 4-6 6-2 6-2 comeback over Muguruza for the #AusOpen women's singles 🏆 # AO2020pic.twitter.com / HU8mijCbTh

Quick third title

Champions of the Australian Open in the women's doubles were Hungarian Timea Babosh and Frenchwoman Kristina Mladenovic. For the third time, they jointly won the Grand Slam tournament, and in Australia they achieved a second career success.

The final match in this type of competition was supposed to be as spectacular as possible - for the first time in ten years, the first two seeded couples reached it. The second numbers Babosh and Mladenovic opposed the first rackets of the tournament Xie Shuwei from Taiwan and Czech Barbora Strytsova.

However, the game did not live up to expectations. Already 72 minutes after the start, the winner was determined. Tennis players from Hungary and France lost even fewer games than in their previous meeting at the Final tournament of last season - only three. The consolation for Xie and Strytsova should be that next week they will still occupy the top two lines of the WTA doubles rating.

🏆 CHAMPIONS 🏆 @ TimeaBabos / @ KikiMladenovic capture their second #AusOpen women's doubles title in three years dominating Hsieh / Strycova 6-2 6-1. # AO2020pic.twitter.com / gscavoI96o

In the footsteps of Novotnaya

The victory in the mixed doubles was won by Czech Barbora Krejcikova and Croat Nicola Mektić sown under the fifth number. In the final, they beat the more eminent duet Bethany Mattek-Sands from the USA and Jamie Murray from the UK, who for two have 16 titles in doubles at Grand Slam tournaments.

For Kreichikova, the mixed finals were the 15th match at the Australian Open. Previously, through qualification, she reached the second round in singles and reached the semifinals paired with Katerina Sinyakova. It was her game at the decisive moment of the final that helped to achieve success. After losing the first set, which Mattek-Sands and Murray finished with four games won in a row, Kreichikova at the reception helped twice to break in the second installment and transfer the match to the champion tie-break. In it, the American-British duo managed to score just one point.

Krejchikova defended the Australian Open champion title in mixed doubles, becoming the first tennis player in 31 years to succeed. The last one was possible for her compatriot Jan Novotná, a former Czech coach who died of cancer in 2017 without waiting for the main successes of her ward. Mektich celebrated his first victory in Grand Slam tournaments.

🏆🏆 @ B_Krejcikova / @ NMektic capture a first team Grand Slam title defeating Mattek-Sands / Murray 5-7 6-4 [10-1].

Krejcikova successfully defends her mixed doubles crown while Mektic wins a maiden Slam trophy. # AusOpen | # AO2020pic.twitter.com / 42zPrUfjaY

The end of an Australian fairy tale

Last year's partner in Kreichikova mixed did not remain without a title this year. American Rajeev Ram, along with Briton Joe Salisbury, became the winner of the Australian Open in the men's doubles. Both of them had not achieved such successes in this tennis discipline before. Ram had been waiting for this especially long - before that he had 57 unsuccessful attempts to win the Grand Slam tournament in a pair, which is a record for the Open Era.

In the final, Ram and Salisbury beat Wild Card holders Max Parsell and Luke Savill, the only representatives of Australia who managed to break into the final of their home major this year. The tournament path of Parsell and Saville was reminiscent of a real fairy tale - before they had only two doubles in doubles at ATP tournaments, but in Melbourne they could get to the finals, which none of the wild card holders had done before.

But in the decisive match, the Australians could not resist the 11th seeded Ram and Salisbury. The match ended with a score of 6: 4, 6: 2 in favor of a duet from the USA and Great Britain. The 35-year-old Ram dedicated his victory to his father, who died of cancer in April 2019.

First Grand Slam feels! 🏆

Congratulations @ RajeevRam / @ joesalisbury92, our # AO2020 men's doubles champions. The 11th seeds def. Aussie wildcards Purcell / Saville 6-4 6-2. # AusOpenpic.twitter.com / DoRMfg30tf