Power Kills: Osaka routs Svitolina to reach Australian Open semifinals

Naomi Osaka was briefly tormented by a bee near the end of her 6-4, 6-1 quarterfinal win over Elina Svitolina at the Australian Open on Wednesday. It followed her for a few seconds as she crossed from one side of the court to the other, before she finally swatted herself free. You might say the moment served as a microcosm of her entire afternoon.

Coming in, Osaka-Svitolina seemed like a tough one to call. Osaka had won the US Open, was ranked higher, and had much more upside in the power and athleticism department. But she had also struggled mightily to dig herself out of early holes and scrape her way through her previous two matches here, against Su-Wei Hsieh and Anastasija Sevastova. While Svitolina had also had her struggles over the weekend, she was riding a two-match winning streak against Osaka. If seemed likely that if there were any dip in play from Osaka, the stubbornly competitive Svitolina would be there to take advantage.

But that’s not how it worked out. Osaka went though plenty of dips in the first set. She was broken at 4-2 and 5-3, and she squandered three sets points at 5-4 on wild errors. Every time she looked like she was about to start dominating, she inexplicably started to spray balls instead. Yet Osaka still won the set.

She won because she had the bigger serve; roughly 15 M.P.H. bigger, which resulted in eight aces to Svitolina’s one. Osaka won because she had the bigger return; any time Svitolina missed a first serve, Osaka crept inside the baseline and applied pressure. Osaka won because she had more powerful ground strokes; Svitolina generated as much pace as she could, and tried to work the ball into the corners, but all it took was one solid wallop from Osaka and the point was over. Osaka hit 31 winners, Svitolina 11.

That stat told the tale of the match, as well as the tale of modern Grand Slam tennis: Pace kills, weapons are everything, and mistakes can be made up for with explosiveness. The modestly-powered Svitolina is a tenacious, formidable, title-winning player everywhere but at the majors, where she has yet to reach a semifinal. Osaka is already a Slam champ because, as one Aussie commentator put it tonight, “she has power to burn.” Svitolina took a medical timeout and had a shoulder rubdown in the second set, but whatever her condition, she wasn’t going to match M.P.H.’s with Osaka.

Can Osaka win her second Slam at age 20? Whether she plays Serena Williams or Karolina Pliskova in the semifinals, it won’t be quite so easy for Osaka to swat herself free.

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