2013 Australian Open: Clash of the Titans - Sharapova Grunting her Way Through

It wasn’t exactly an upset, but then in a way it was.

Maria Sharapova taking on Venus Williams in the third round promised to be an interesting match considering the former’s red-hot, trail-blazing form and the latter’s slow-but-sure rise from fatigue and illness. Unlike years ago, when one could have expected such a match to have been played in the latter stages of a Grand Slam, this was a third round match. A definite early exit – either way – one that probably no tennis fan would have wished for.

On paper, Sharapova held a slight edge over the American with a 4-3 head-to-head and a quadruple of bagels in her first two rounds. She was at her finest, most sublime form, something that she hadn’t been able to demonstrate for longer periods consistently in the past few years. In comparison, Venus had a pretty sedate outing in her first and second round matches. Expected to win both her earlier rounds, yet the underdog for the tournament, Venus Williams wasn’t the favourite against Maria Sharapova but someone with an outside chance of getting through. She did have the game to go toe-to-toe with Sharapova and those optimistic enough to predict even believed that she could get the job done and turn the pressure on at the 2013 Australian Open.

But what actually transpired was gruesome, agonising and slowly painful. For Venus Williams that is. All she got was four games – three on her own serve and of these, one in the first set and two in the second and one on a slightly lopsided break in the second. However, it wasn’t much about playing badly as it was about playing well. Venus did have the shots and she did come up with a few brilliant ones at odd intervals during the match, but she was thoroughly outplayed by Sharapova for almost its entire duration.

Although Venus was more consistent with her serve than Sharapova – at one point in the first set, Sharapova had a first-serve percentage of 13 percent – her opponent’s returns made it difficult for Venus to focus on her game-plan. Each ball was struck perfectly with no room for errors, or for Venus to try it hit back in place, for that matter. And when Venus did have chances to put the ball back in place, her shots swung erratically instead of finding their mark on the court. Her forehand wing, her strongest asset even on her bad days, let her down immensely as Sharapova’s ground-strokes ran her ragged all around. At the end of the first set, Williams had an unforced error count of 13 to Sharapova’s five with a total of just 14 points won to Sharapova’s 26. Needless to say, Sharapova won the first set in less than 30 minutes, converting three break points out of five chances.

The second set began in the same way with Sharapova racing ahead 3-0 with an early break of serve in the second game and then with a crucial one in the sixth game to serve out the match in the seventh. Neither Sharapova nor Williams had forayed to the net till that point in the match and incidentally it was Venus who won what was probably the only true net play for the entire length of the match. As compared to Sharapova who converted five of her 13 break point chances, Venus managed to convert just one out of the six she faced. Her lone breakpoint was courtesy Sharapova’s surprising lack of focus while serving out the match at 5-1 in the second set. And though Venus did well enough to hold on to her next service game, Sharapova closed out the match in the ninth game convincingly.

There were a lot of talking points that emerged after the match. Venus’ inability to control her shots, except for those snatches in the second set, and her strange disinclination to stay on the baseline instead of coming to the net so as to try and put Sharapova out of her comfort zone did indeed seem unusual.

As regards Sharapova, observing her run at the Australian Open progressing grandly without any hiccups whatsoever, it would be prudent to say that at this juncture, alongside Serena Williams, the Russian also seems an equally worthy contender to win the title.