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You gaze on, your eyes transfixed, as she tosses the ball high in the air. The ball takes an eternity to come back down, and the gracefully arched back uncoils as the racquet approaches the unsuspecting ball making its merry way towards the ground. There is a loud ‘thud!’ of racquet hitting ball, as she launches herself forward like a predatory force, punctuating the powerful strike with a piercing scream. The whole sequence of motions blends together to form an irresistible weapon designed purely with one objective – destruction.
In a perfect world, the Maria Sharapova serve would have made for captivating viewing, if not for its technical soundness, then certainly for the unrelenting aggression of the protagonist that it showcases so vividly. In the unfair world that we live in, though, the Sharapova serve is more a sadist’s object than a poet’s muse. When she steps up to the mark to deliver a second serve, you almost want to close your eyes in fear. When she tosses the ball in the air, you pray that there is not even a millimeter of a deviation from its intended trajectory. When she lets out her trademark shriek, you want to thrust rocks into your ears. And when she sends the ball flying beyond the baseline or into the middle of the net for her umpteenth double fault, you want to kill yourself. As exquisite as Sharapova may seem off the court to most people, her game has become the personification of ugly.
There was plenty of that ugliness on display in her 3rdround match against Flavia Pennetta yesterday which ended in an unexpected 3-6, 6-3, 4-6 loss for Sharapova. There were almost as many breaks of serve as holds in the match, with Sharapova being broken 7 times and Pennetta 6. While that may not be all that uncommon for a WTA match, here’s the game-changer: Sharapova committed 60 unforced errors in 3 sets (none of which went the full distance), including 12 double faults. Errors flowed off the Sharapova racquet like water, especially on the forehand side. Normal rally balls were sent sailing beyond the baseline. Easy putaways were buried into the net. On-the-run shots were struck violently out of the court. Usually the Russian makes up for her misses by bashing the ball past her opponent just as frequently, but yesterday Sharapova managed a measly (relatively speaking, of course – ordinarily this would be a fairly decent number) 30 winners. After the match, Sharapova said that she didn’t feel comfortable with any part of her game during the match. It would’ve felt more appropriate if she had said she was mortally afraid of hitting the ball during the match.
Despite her cringeworthy play, though, Sharapova still managed to claw her way back into the match, her famed resilience and competitiveness in full display. After some typically gutsy shot-making, she found herself at 4-4 in the 3rd set, and many thought she had Pennetta right where she wanted her. It’s the tried-and-tested formula against a lower-ranked player, you know – stay in the match till the very end, and watch your opponent succumb to nerves at the final hurdle. Serving at 4-4, however, Pennetta surprisingly managed to hold serve, taking her within a game of clinching the match. Still, it seemed like a minor blip for Sharapova, who seemed prepared to stay on court all day and who was armed with the knowledge that she hadn’t lost a three-setter all year. That’s precisely when the fatal flaw in Sharapova’s post-injury game surfaced like a deadly, insurmountable disease. Two double faults put her 0-30 down, and with the finish line in sight, Pennetta pounced on her opportunity, breaking at love and sealing the error-strewn encounter. In a matter of seconds, Sharapova’s reputation as a tireless fighter took a mighty dent, and her tragic serve became the topic of discussion once again.
Sharapova’s struggles and labored successes since coming back to the tour after a potentially career-threatening shoulder injury have rightly drawn admiration and applause from the tennis world. With things taking so long to fall in place, she could have easily sat back on her million-dollar fortune and hung up her boots, as was being suggested by so many analysts who felt the game had passed her by. But she hung tough, and she’s been rewarded with a couple of strong runs at the Slams this year and a return to the Top 5 in the rankings. But is that enough for a woman not used to winning the consolation prize? This year, both the French Open and Wimbledon seemed hers for the taking, but her shaky serve and inconsistent play ensured she came up short just when it really mattered. Here, again, with World No. 1 Caroline Wozniacki floundering, a strong run at this US Open might have helped Sharapova clinch the year-end No. 1 ranking, a feat that has remained firmly out of her grasp despite her many other accomplishments. But she has let another fantastic opportunity slip away, and you have to wonder whether the pile of missed chances will come back to haunt her.
The thing that makes Sharapova’s situation all the more poignant is that there are some pretty obvious quick-fixes that she can use for her problems, at least to get some short-term results. She can put more spin on her groundstrokes. She can follow her baseline missiles into the net every once in a while. She can opt for variety over power in some of the neutral rallies. Or she could circumvent all of her problems by simply going for less pace and more margin on the second serve. But doing any of these things would go against the very fabric into which Sharapova is wired. It’s her nature to relentlessly attack at every opportunity, and up until this point at least, no amount of setbacks have made her second-guess that nature in the slightest. Does that make her a lesser tennis player? Her recent results suggest that it does.
Sharapova seems to have done everything she could to rise out of her post-surgery doldrums, including dramatically shoring up her return game and changing her coach. Unfortunately for her, even ‘everything’ has not been enough. Her serve continues to have a mind of its own, and it continues to cause her downfall at crunch times. The problem is partly technical, yes – there’s a marked difference in her service motions before and after the surgery. But it is as much, if not more, about the mental aspect of the stroke; she simply doesn’t have the unshakeable belief in her serve that she once had, and it is unlikely that she ever will again. And while we wrap our heads around that, the fact remains that you cannot win a Grand Slam with a wildly unreliable serve, even on the WTA tour. Whether Sharapova can fix her serve and take that final step towards returning to the game’s elite is anybody’s guess. What is certain, however, is that the work that she does on the stroke could make or break the remainder of an already decorated career.
On a lighter note check the Video from WTA :)
What’s The One Thing You Would Do In New York? We Ask
