It might not have been a match for the DVD scrapbook, let’s be honest, but history seldom takes much notice of the quality of Grand Slam finals; only who won them. Serena Williams won her fourth Australian Open title with a 6-0 6-3 scoreline and a ferociously dominant performance against Dinara Safina, and in doing so lifted her 10th Grand Slam trophy. Everything else is just detail.
It is hard to put into words just how well Serena played in her 58-minute rout of the woman who will be No.2 behind her in the rankings when the new standings are released on Monday. Early on, Safina must have wondered just what she had to do to win a point, let alone a game. Even when she broke at the start of the second set, she never appeared likely to stop the rampant Williams from making herself seventh in the all-time list of female Grand Slam singles champions. By winning, the American overtook Monica Seles in that illustrious honour roll. She has a way to go before catching up to either Chris Evert or Martina Navratilova on 18, let alone Helen Wills Moody (19), Steffi Graf (22) or Margaret Court (24), but you would not put anything past her.
“I idolised Steffi Graf growing up and Martina Navratilova was my role model, so when I think of those names I can’t even think of myself there. But people are starting to think about me that way, and that’s just uber-cool,” said Williams afterwards. “I was a little nervous actually going into the match against Dinara, then I told myself that I had nothing to lose even though everyone was putting the pressure on me. I didn’t want to lose that focus. Dinara’s a warrior, and she never gives up.”
That is certainly true – after all, Safina did save match points against Alize Cornet in the fourth round – but even the Russian had to concede that she was barely in the contest against Williams. Safina was charmingly apologetic afterwards, and raised a smile from herself and the crowd when she put the disparity between her and Williams into comedic context during her speech. “She was just too good. I was just a ballgirl on the court today,” said Safina, who admitted that she had worried by the pressure of not just winning her first Grand Slam title but of ascending to the No.1 ranking.
“She had been in that situation many, many times, but this was a new situation for me,” said the Russian. “She played exactly the way she had to play, she was much more aggressive, and she took all the time away from me. She never even let me into the match. She is a champion. She proved that. She puts pressure on you. It’s not that I doubted myself, but she pushes you to go for too much because you know that you cannot give her an easy ball because she will go after it.”
Williams goes after titles too, and after winning back-to-back Grand Slams – following last year’s US Open victory – for the first time since her first period of dominance in 2002 and 2003, she has every chance of taking women’s tennis by the throat once more. Six years ago she completed the ‘Serena Slam’ by winning all four Grand Slam titles in a row, but her victory in the first major of this season has created the possibility of her achieving the calendar Grand Slam for the first time, a feat last achieved by Graf in 1988. As Safina put it after taking her beating, “it’s up to Serena now.”
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