Marion Bartoli bids farewell

Marion Bartoli announces her retirement

Marion Bartoli ended her tennis career yesterday in the same way she always played it – a least expected move with a dash of unconventionality.

After losing in the second round at Cincinnati to Simona Halep, Bartoli chose to bid a sudden and tearful goodbye to the game that has dominated a vast majority of her life.

To say the announcement came as a surprise would be an understatement. In fact, it seems to have been a decision taken quite abruptly, if her recent tweets are any evidence to go by: even a day before, she looked forward to the New Haven event scheduled for next week. But in the end, her persistent physical niggles and injuries seemed to have made the choice clear for her.

“I have pain everywhere after 45 minutes or an hour of play,” she said. “I’ve been doing this for so long. And yeah, it’s just body-wise, I can’t do it any more.”

It is also easy to assume that her memorable maiden Major title at Wimbledon just a couple of months ago was a significant factor in the decision she made. She had fulfilled her childhood dream, she had established her individual tennis legacy, she now had personal Grand Slam tales she could regale her grandchildren with.

These thoughts must have made it easier for her to finally give in to her injury woes, rather than, say, take a sabbatical, and get back on tour when healthy.

But therein also lies the sense of disappointment with her decision for the common tennis fan. The period in a tennis player’s career immediately following her first taste of success at a Major, usually makes for compelling following.

Winning a Grand Slam title tends to be a career-altering, even life-changing, event for a tennis player. The media spotlight is suddenly always on the player, the expectations and interest increase manifold. Different players tend to react differently to this situation.

Some are inspired to play at a consistently higher level than before, soak in all the adulation, and get on a roll, winning multiple Majors like it was their God-given birthright. Others lose focus, get distracted, and lose their way in the tennis wilderness.

In the case of Bartoli, it was going to be especially interesting, given her vast experience of having played more Grand Slams than any other woman before winning her maiden title, and of course, given her unique personality quirks. But, as one should have perhaps expected, she chose to confound us all in her own way.

At her first high-profile event after Wimbledon in the Rogers Cup last week, she was drawn to take on Serena Williams in a delectable encounter in the quarterfinals, but she withdrew with an abdominal injury in the previous round. And today, those injuries conspired to bring her entire career to a full stop.

We will now never know how Marion Bartoli played as a Wimbledon champion. We will only know that Marion Bartoli was a deserving Wimbledon champion. And that leaves a lingering bitter-sweet feeling with us.

But even in her moment of unexpected departure, there were some constants we have come to associate with her over the years. Immediately after the thought of retirement came to her, the only person she consulted was her father, Walter – the central, and sometimes controversial, figure in her journey from rough, uneven courts in France as a young child to the hallowed grass courts of Wimbledon as a Grand Slam champion.

There were also the frank emotions on display at the press conference, as there always are with Bartoli. She let the tears fall uninhibitedly as she announced her emotional decision, in much the same way she always let her intensity speak for her on the tennis court.

Marion Bartoli, we will remember you as one of the more distinctive champions of Wimbledon, who played it your own way, and was a success doing it. We will admire you for the courage and fight you always brought to a tennis court.

We will respect you for never cowing down to the endless talk about how you did not fit into the typical champion’s profile. And we will love you for your unique, quirky personality. Tennis stands poorer for your retirement today.

Stay healthy, and stay well, Maid Marion. Au revoir!