Fiend at Court Unplugged
Late in the 2021 US Open Women’s Finals, Emma Raducanu skidded for a ball in the deep corner of the court. She was so low to the court that her knee dragged the court leaving a skid mark of the skin that was formerly on her knee on the surface. The match had to be paused while the wound was bandaged.
Sometimes a player will claim that they left their blood on the court. It is pretty rare for that statement to be literally true. The most amazing part of the point is that Raducanu returned the ball, popped back up and continued the point. The women who are competing at the highest level of tennis are modern gladiators.
It is a new era. Evonne Goolagong won her first Australian Open in 1974, defeating Chris Evert in the Finals. Her account of the match including the following passage: “Chris, the little Miss Cool, who once declared no point is worth falling down over, looked like she’d just come out of the make-up room.”
Evert’s opposition to hitting the court is a fact that I keep stumbling across in multiple sources. I have come to the impression that it was something she frequently said. While other players of her era were more willing to dive for a shot, most of the time they were playing on softer grass and clay court surfaces. Few players were willing to throw their bodies around on the abrasive hard court surface.
It is a new era of women’s tennis that has a lot more to do with a generation of players who are willing to leave it all on the court. That transcends the breakthrough performances of Raducanu, and Leylah Fernandez at the tournament this year.
- Pssst: Breakthrough at home, Paul Daffey, The Sydney Morning Herald, January 4, 2014.
