(Wimbledon) It is therefore at Wimbledon, in the temple of tennis, that the Tunisian Ons Jabeur or the Czech Marketa Vondrousova will win this dreamed-of first Grand Slam title on Saturday.
The experience
Both have already reached the final of a Major: at Roland-Garros in 2019 for Vondrousova, at Wimbledon and at the United States Open last year for Jabeur.
Since her final, the Czech has had surgery on her left wrist twice (2019 and 2022) so that she has missed two editions of Wimbledon (2020 and 2022). Fourteenth in the world at its highest after Roland-Garros 2019, it briefly emerged from the top 100 at the end of last season and plays in London as 42e.
If she reached the 1/8 finals on hard court at the Australian Open and the United States Open, her results on the London turf were much less brilliant: in four appearances, she only reached once the second round (2021) without going beyond.
At 24, Vondrousova has only won one title on the circuit (Biel 2017). What could be better than Wimbledon to win a second?
Opposite, there will be Jabeur, the first Arab player to have reached the quarter-finals of a Grand Slam tournament (Australia 2020), the first Arab player to have played in the final at Wimbledon (2022).
The Tunisian, currently 6e world player after reaching 2e WTA rank in June 2022, is also the first player to chain two Wimbledon finals since Serena Williams (2018-2019).
Above all, her touch game works miracles on the grass (she won two of her four titles there, Birmingham 2021 and Berlin 2022): no player has won more than her 28 victories on this surface since 2021 and the last to to have won that many in three years is Maria Sharapova (2004-06).
“I have more experience (than last year), I know how to better manage the different situations during the match,” she underlines.
“I also think I’m hitting better, I have more confidence in my shots. As for my service, it is improving,” she adds.
The facts prove her right: she is the third player to have scored the most aces since the start of the tournament (29) behind Elena Rybakina (33) and Aryna Sabalenka (45)… two players she beat in the quarterfinals then in halves.
The course
Jabeur can claim to have successively beaten four Grand Slam winners: Bianca Andreescu (United States Open 2019), Petra Kvitova (Wimbledon 2011 and 2014), Elena Rybakina (Wimbledon 2022) and Aryna Sabalenka (Australia 2023).
“I want my journey to be rewarded […] So I’m going to go all out and I hope this time it will pass, ”launched the Tunisian.
Vondrousova snuck in by dismissing a priori superior players like Veronika Kudermetova (12e), Donna Vekic (21e), and Jessica Pegula (4e), before putting an abrupt end to the epic of the Ukrainian Elina Svitolina, semi-finalist 2019.
“I beat Kudermetova and Vekic, who are very good on grass. So I thought, ‘OK, maybe I’ll get better and I can do something here,’” she says.
State of mind
After having mastered two ultra powerful and right-handed players like her (Rybakina and Sabalenka), Jabeur will this time face an opponent whose game is more comparable to hers (Vondrousova likes to do drop shots and slices), but left-handed
“I will try to take my revenge. I haven’t beaten her this year”, announces Jabeur in reference to her two defeats against Vondrousova at the Australian Open and then at Indian Wells.
“We will both be hungry for victory,” she adds.
For her part, the Czech recognizes that what is happening to her “is crazy”.
“But anything is possible in tennis,” she notes.
For the final, she will also have a moral reinforcement of weight in the stands in the person of her husband, obliged until then to stay at home to keep the cat.
“We messaged the cat sitter and he’s coming home,” she said.
