Azarenka's loud, pressure-filled circus ride

There are few things in the world more amusing or exasperating than watching a seemingly insignificant sequence of events being turned into a monumental, stop-the-presses cataclysm from which there’s no looking away. Last year, Novak Djokovic‘s 43-match winning streak to start the season was hyped up to such an extent that the streak took on a life of its own, eventually drowning its protagonist in a whirlpool of pressure. This year, the small matter of Victoria Azarenka getting off to a 17-0 start is threatening to reach the same proportions as Djokovic’s streak; already, parallels are being drawn thick and fast between the two starts. You can almost hear the collective holding of tennis followers’ breaths everywhere – how unthinkable would it be for Djokovic’s incredible feat to be repeated the very next year, and that too by a woman? If Azarenka keeps winning for a reasonable while longer, we’re in for one noisy, expectant circus ride that will consume every other tennis story on the planet.

Come to think of it though, there actually are many similarities in the games of Djokovic and Azarenka. Both Djokovic and Azarenka possess consistently lethal returns of serve. They are both comparably rock solid when prowling the baseline. They both lack a signature offensive weapon, though their backhands come close. And neither of them has a perceptible weakness that can be picked on and exploited, a la Roger Federer‘s backhand, Maria Sharapova‘s movement or Rafael Nadal‘s serve. Then there’s also the mandatory inspirational/heart-tugging story that the two have in common – for Djokovic it was leading Serbia to Davis Cup glory that supposedly led to his transformation as a player, while for Azarenka it is the fact that she would have quit tennis a year ago if not for a strong reprimand from her grandmother, a reprimand that took her all the way to the Australian Open title and the World No. 1 ranking. (Aside: how many more times do we have to listen to that grandmom story before we enforce a moratorium on it?)

The woman herself has displayed conflicting reactions when dealing with the inevitable questions that surround any player who starts the year in dominating fashion. When asked about the possibility of the Golden Slam (that holiest of Holy Grails in tennis – winning all four majors in the year plus the Olympic gold medal), Azarenka was forthright and confident, saying that she definitely was going to have the “mentality to try to do that”. Fast forward to a week later – Azarenka had conquered the Doha tournament, adding another 5 matches to her perfect season. You’d have thought a fresh title victory would have added to her sky-high confidence. But when the similarities between her start to the season and that of Djokovic last year were pointed out to her in her post match conference, she decided to go the coy route, stating that she had a long way to go before she could start comparing herself with Djokovic. Is this Azarenka’s way of managing expectations from the media? If so, she’ll need a lot more from where that’s coming, at least until she keeps winning.

The signs have all been good so far. Azarenka has dealt with the ranking issue better than all the other newly crowned No.1 players in recent memory. Unlike Ana Ivanovic in 2008, the possibility of her ascending to the throne didn’t have to be kept secret from her until after she played the deciding match – Azarenka was fully aware that she’d have the top ranking if she won the Australian Open final against Sharapova, and she grabbed the opportunity with some unexpectedly nerveless play. Unlike Jelena Jankovic in 2008, who spent countless hours in the gym in order to add firepower to her shots the moment she became No. 1, Azarenka hasn’t felt the need to change her game, because she knows it’s good enough to get the job done as it is. Unlike Dinara Safina in 2009, Azarenka hasn’t crumbled in the face of people questioning her place at the top in the absence of a Slam trophy; it helps, of course, that Azarenka has already won a Major, and that she doesn’t have Serena Williams to contend with (memory refresher: when Serena Williams, who had just won Wimbledon, was asked about Safina’s right to the No. 1 ranking, she came up with this gem: “I think Dinara Safina did a great job to get to No. 1. She won Madrid and Rome”). Also, unlike Caroline Wozniacki over the last two years, Azarenka seems to realize that the ultimate accomplishment in tennis remains winning Major trophies, and that playing every tournament in sight just to accumulate ranking points is not really the best way to go.

Rankings apart, there have been several other positives for Azarenka this year. She has learned to navigate through questions about her incessant on-court shrieking with equanimity, and that sure takes some doing (in one of her recent press conferences, she equated on-court grunting with snoring, much to the amusement of her audience). She doesn’t retire from matches out of illness or injury anymore, as evidenced by her decision to continue playing her semifinal against Agnieszka Radwanska in Doha last week despite badly twisting her ankle mid-match. Is it actually true that Azarenka has her head in the right place? It would have seemed unlikely for a player prone to bursting into tears and throwing loud tantrums to ever achieve this, but Azarenka has, somehow, done it. Maybe Grandma Glorious should consider becoming a motivational speaker.

None of this would have really mattered, though, if Azarenka didn’t have the game to back it all up. Happily, she has exhibited just the right kind of controlled aggression in her matches lately to give hope that we may finally have a steady force at the top of the women’s game that doesn’t come up short when it really matters. Azarenka may not be the biggest hitter in the game, and she may always remain vulnerable to, say, an on-fire Petra Kvitova or Serena Williams, but she is a fine striker of the ball in her own right. Those ear-splitting shrieks are usually accompanied by powerful, well-directed drives, and importantly, those drives are hit with a great degree of consistency. Her superb movement and defensive skills add even more ammunition to her repertoire, making her as complete a player in today’s game as anyone can hope to see.

Azarenka starts her Dubai campaign tomorrow, and it’s possible that her winning streak may end in her very first outing at the tournament, quashing all those premature comparisons with Djokovic’s streak. But with all the attention being heaped on her lately, Azarenka actually seems to be the only player competing on the women’s tour right now. That is why, if or when Azarenka does lose, it will leave a gaping hole in our daily dose of tennis fodder. As exasperating as it is to watch the media creating a mountain out of a molehill, we’ll miss all that hype surrounding Azarenka’s streak. And as much as we may hate to admit it, we’ll miss that noisy, expectant, pressure-filled circus ride.