Aryna Sabalenka, Australian Open champion: the roaring lioness who laughed first and laughed best

Every story of a great champion begins as a game. So, what is living Aryna Sabalenkabrand new two time champion of Australian Open, it’s a very nice timeline to develop. It all starts the first day you come into contact with a racket. It was enough to hit it and make the ball drag on the floor to feel that the first step had been taken. Passion begins to grow as natural and acquired skills are enhanced. And with that growth We end up understanding that by working all dreams can come true.

Understanding that you have the potential to compete, however, yes a double border. It allows athletes, on the one hand, to inflate their chest. But as the years pass, it also begins to generate great pressure. We must learn to live with them, to find motivation both in the goals achieved and in the disappointments. And this was the path that Sabalenka took, who arrived on the professional circuit as a player of enormous power, with a lot of strength, but He always had to fight with his inconsistencies. And that, perhaps, was the main adversary to overcome.

His serve, at times, seemed indomitable and uncontrollable. It was a headache for her. And this led her to stumble. However, she had the great ability to find a solution to problems. He had a lot of tennis, but he had to work on his mentality, which wasn’t his strong point.. And the key appeared when he realized that those failures would be the operating cost of the next great success. He realized that in order to achieve great things he had to learn to deal with difficult times and things like that the real problem wasn’t the problem, but how he tried to solve them. He understood that he had to find a way out another way. Despair, anguish and anger only led to helplessness.

Sabalenka came to this tournament with a very high level and how, she herself said, placing the greatest demands on her shoulders despite having finished the week before this Grand Slam tournament. She raised the bar and clearly, within the team, she was the first to achieve the goal. So she ended up winning the tournament in resounding fashion. And, beyond the trophy won and the dollars and points pocketed, Her best feeling must be that of having managed to face this grand final by taking on the responsibility of being the overwhelming favourite.. That everything happened through her.

In this way he erased the Chinese from the field Qinwen Zheng. In an hour and 16 minutes of play and giving up just five games, he stuck to the original plan to the letter. He believed that the difference in speed and consistency in his game would make life difficult for his opponent who had not faced players among the 50 best in the world on his way to definition. And that’s what happened at Rod Laver Arena. It’s very difficult strategically, unless you have a lot of resources, to counteract that power and clarity to minimize unforced errors.

Introspection has not taken away his other great fuel, namely his charisma and his indelible smile.. We saw Sabalenka cross Melbourne Park in a spectacular mood, always happy, with a team that showed enormous energy and understood that in a hyper-professional sport neither joy nor distraction can be missing. Because it works just like fertilizer for all the learning you do day after day. Play down the bad moments, learn from them, enjoy the moment, understanding that tennis is first and foremost a game and that honoring your roots means not forgetting how it all began. He seems to have understood that he doesn’t have to betray himself to achieve great things. Of course there are a lot of pressures. But we must never forget, and you are very clear, that it must continue to be a game. That’s why the joy of him. Hence that jovial spirit. Understanding that playing tennis at that level is a real privilege.

It was also liberating. She herself had made a sort of commitment: to realize the desire shared with her father to win two Grand Slam titles before the age of 25. This became another motivation because she lost her father four years ago. He also experienced difficult moments due to political issues that hit him hard, such as the war between Russia and Ukraine and his closeness to the president of Belarus… He had no choice but to try to live with those situations that often generate enormous interference in that search for excellence, in that need to be focused and aligned.

Sabalenka now begins to raise the bar a little higher. Because it brings us back to the memory of it Serena Williams it was hard to stop him because There was no way to “turn down the volume” or deflate the ball so it wouldn’t beat you up during games.. A powerful serve combined with a moving forehand were his calling cards. Now he’s added wisdom and strength to the menu. Everything is summed up in that roaring lion tattooed on his left forearm which serves to remind him that you should never lower your arms when things aren’t working.

His coronation in Australia also leaves a very beautiful backdrop for the future of tennis to come. Because it presents one of those clashes of styles that end up being magnetic. It was already powerful, but now it is smooth and stable. Is strong. Therefore, heThe Polish Iga Swiatek, even if she remains number one in the world, already knows that Sabalenka, the girl with the constant smile, is a great threat for his kingdom. Whoever laughs first sometimes laughs even better.