!Vica by Pete Bodo
MIAMI, Fla.—Victoria Azarenka, a semifinalist in Key Biscayne after eradicating world No. 2 Kim Clijsters, apparently has discovered the secret to life, and it turns out not to be all that complicated. "I'm just in a good mood always, now," said the 21-year old. This comes as somewhat shocking news to many tennis regulars, who had long since anointed Azarenka the Miss Sorehead of the WTA. "Doesn't matter when I'm on the court, off the court," she gushed after the match. "I feel like I'm happy all the time."
Well, Vika, good for you! But then many of us—or your peers, anyway—might be also be loving life if the only thing standing in our way to the semifinals in a tournament as big as the combined Miami event was a listless and seemingly uninterested Clijsters. Usually, when a player of Clijsters' caliber pulls off the sort of escape she managed the other night against Ana Ivanovic—a former Grand Slam champion and world No. 1 player herself—she (or he) is apt to feel invincible and is thus especially dangerous. That Clijsters bounced back from such a potentially inspirational comeback with such an uninspired performance tells you something. Where was the adrenaline surge that players so often surf after the big fightback?
"I just didn't feel good out there," Clijsters admitted in her presser afterward. "Just mentally, physically, didn't feel right...just kind of feel like I didn't have any fighting spirit."
Alright, some things you can't force or control, and Clijsters was honest enough to admit: "(It's been) a tough few last days. (But) not in a way that I should not be ready for. I train hard enough to physically be capable of doing that."
But that still leaves open the question: Why can someone of Clijsters ability and status be so...wasteful? Especially when she might have gained valuable ground on No. 1 Wozniacki by winning here? When it comes to providing incentive, the tournament can't be faulted.
It was clear from the start last night that Clijsters seemed intent on duplicating her adventure with Ivanovic. The really surprising thing is that she did it. Think about it. What were the odds, given all the possible combinations and variables, that Clijsters would wind up facing match points while down 1-5 in the decisive set? I wonder what Clijsters' final 2011 W-L record will be for matches in which she was down 1-5 and match points in the decisive set?
Granted, Azarenka looked pretty good. Just as surviving an impossible situation usually inspires a player, returning to a scene of success can also lift and energize a player. When Vera Zvonareva gets off the plane in Pattaya City, she must feel like Martina Navratilova strolling through the Fred Perry gate at Wimbledon. But Azarenka played down that angle when she was asked if she's starting to feel like it was 2009 (when she won here) all over again:
"No, it doesn't not at all," she said, smiling. "It's 2011. Completely new year; different tour. And I played Kim. And she was not there at 2009, so definitely not the same."
Well, let no one say she doesn't think literally. But Azarenka did admit, "Miami certainly is a great place. So much excitement from people and so many great fans coming. I don't know, it's always going to be a special place for me, so I'm really enjoying my time here."
This was Azarenka's second win (against four losses) over Clijsters, and she believed it was built upon her overall fitness and good health, as well as a willingness to play more aggressively and to move forward into the court. And with both Wozniacki and Clijsters, the top two seeds respectively, out of the event, the tournament is really there for any of the semifinalists to win. Sharapova is the only Grand Slam champion in that group, yet she's also the one who's been most inconsistent, and looked most vulnerable. Clijsters, the only other former Grand Slam champ to reach the quarterfinals, looked less than commanding herself in the run-up to last night's quarterfinal.
Clijsters' loss to Azarenka suggests that at some elemental level, the Belgian No. 2 has a motivation problem. The opportunities are enormous; how can she pass them up, what with the Williams sisters out of the picture and Wozniacki still too green to dominate (if that's what she's destined to do)? But I wonder if her heart is really in it. I have no doubt that she wants to try (or, to use my preferred phrase, she wants to want); she certainly works hard and does all the due diligence of a true professional.
But you can't fool the heart, no matter how much "sense" it makes for Clijsters to continue playing in an environment where merely showing up guarantees material rewards that nobody in his or her right mind would pass up. Who can blame Clijsters? What would you do, in her Filas?
The WTA needs to load up with players who can imagine nothing more enjoyable than winning big tournaments, and being out there testing themselves, week-after-week. Women who love to compete and play and bask in the adulation of the crowd. Women who like a good fight, cat or court.
Happy Azarenka is in that category, as are a number of other young players in the current pipeline, including another Miami semifinalist, Andrea Petkovic. It's the job of those women to shove the reluctant, uncommitted, flawed or wounded competitors out of the way. It sounds cruel, but that's how a healthy game works.
That would make everyone happy, just like Azarenka.