Victoria Azarenka (photo ©Assaf Yekuel) reached the final defeating Monica Niculescu, Eleni Daniilidou, Jamie Hampton, Elena Vesnina, Svetlana Kuznetsova and Sloane Stephens. So far she lost only one set to Jamie Hampton. She’s the Australian Open defending champion.
Na Li (or Li Na if you prefer Chinese names conventions) reached the final defeating Sesil Karatantcheva, Olga Govortsova, Sorana Cirstea, Julia Goerges, Agnieszka Radwanska and Maria Sharapova. So far she lost no sets. She’s at her second final at the Australian Open after the one she played in 2011.
Na Li starts the match making some mistakes and Victoria Azarenka breaks her immediately but gets broken back in the second game. In the fourth game the Chinese returns very well and breaks her opponent again: it’s the first of three consecutive breaks. Azarenka starts giving her shots higher trajectories and something changes. In the ninth game Na Li serves for the set but loses her service game. The tenth game is a struggle but on the fourth set point Azarenka makes a double fault and Na Li wins the first set 6-4.
In the second set, Victoria Azarenka starts well again soon breaking Li Na. The Chinese has a break point in the second game but she doesn’t succed in the counter-break and in the third game she loses her service game again. Azarenka doesn’t exploit her advantage and gets broken. In the fifth game, Na Li twists an ankle but after a check-up and some taping she can go on, in the sixth game she even has three break points but can’t tie the score in the set. In the seventh game Azarenka it’s who has two break points but the Chinese wins her service game and in the eighth game she breaks her opponent and ties the score 4-4. However, in the ninth game Azarenka breaks the Chinese again and in the next game she closes the set 6-4.
The third set started like the previous ones, with Victoria Azarenka breaking Na Li but this time she gets broken back in the second game. In Australia today it’s a national holiday and in Melbourne there are fireworks so the match is interrupted for a few minutes. When the game resumes Na Li falls again and hits her head on the ground. Luckily, once again it’s nothing serious and she can go on. In the fourth game the Chinese has a break point but Azarenka wins her service game and in the next game breaks Na Li. In the eighth game the Chinese has a break point but fails to tie the score and in the next game loses her service delivering the third set 6-3, the match and the confirmation of her title at the Australian Open to Azarenka.
It wasn’t a particularly good final from the technical point of view due to the tension of the players. Na Li played a great tournament but in the final she made 57 unforced errors which led to her defeat. She can still be optimistic for the upcoming tournaments and for the season on clay. Victoria Azarenka took several games to really get into the match but in the end she managed to retain the title she won last year and her first position in the WTA rankings. Her problem is still the tension and must keep on working on that to be more prepared for the grand finals.
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