The 2017 Apia International is in the books and was wrapped up with an all-top ten final between Agnieszka Radwanska and Johanna Konta. It was the same schedule as always but Sydney felt even more rushed than usual! Still, there were plenty of highlights so if you missed out on the tennis this week, hopefully this post will act as a sufficient recap of events. Read on for the Match Points from Sydney.
Singles Champion
Johanna Konta produced another superb display in the final to beat Agnieszka Radwanska for the first time in a 6-4 6-2 victory. Konta continues to astound me in the startling strides she has made in the past 18 months. Based on her recent form, she is one of the most consistent performers on the WTA tour and particularly on hard court. Many congrats to Jo!
Doubles Champions
Timea Babos and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova won the doubles title, beating Sania Mirza and Barbora Strycova, 6-4 6-4 in Friday’s final.
Super Snap
Daria Kasatkina secured the best win of her career, defeating Angelique Kerber in the second round. Her reaction was lovely!
Super Stat
The quarter-final between Caroline Wozniacki and Barbora Strycova was the longest match of the year so far and may take a while to be topped at three hours and 20 minutes. In pretty horrendous conditions, Barbora prevailed in three tight sets.
Comeback Kid
There weren’t many comebacks this week in Sydney. Of the 29 matches, only 5 went the distance. The only player to recover from a set down was Daria Kasatkina who fought back from 2-6 1-3 down to defeat Timea Babos in the first round, 2-6 6-4 6-3.
Memorable Match
It was not a great week for memorable matches but the one I was most intrigued watching (albeit with patchy quality) was the first rounder between Caroline Wozniacki and Monica Puig. Wozniacki held onto her lone break of serve in the third set to serve out the win, 6-3 2-6 6-4.
Best Point
This was a stunning rally in the Kerber-Kasatkina match where Kerber produced a magnificent winner down set point in the first set.
Best Shot
Kerber’s shot above would probably fit this category but i’ll add another shot that I found belatedly. Agnieszka Radwanska was awarded shot of the day with a reaction shot from her match against Christina McHale – i’ve picked out another shot which made me go ooooo! I was marvelling at how Aga changes the direction of her racquet so quickly!
Super Sportsmanship
From the first day, there was nice embrace between Belinda Bencic and Yulia Putintseva after Belinda was forced to retire with a toe injury,
LOL Moment
“I feel cold” 😂
Cracking Quote
“I’m not a spring chicken anymore!”
Tennis Draw Challenge Champion
Congratulations to IIguy27 who won the Draw Challenge for Sydney. To join in the fun, you can enter Tennis Draw Challenge and join the Moo’s Tennis Blog league.
Moo's Tennis Blog 
Radwanska’s loss to Konta will probably make her not take anything for granted for the AO.
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She has a do-able draw, though I reckon Pliskova might finally prove her a bit of a challenge should they meet in the quarters.
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Here’s an extract from the Guardian’s piece on Jo’s prospects in the AO next week;
“She was just playing unbelievable tennis from the beginning until the end,” said Agnieszka Radwanska, the estimable Pole who could take only six games off the British No1 in an hour and 22 minutes of the Sydney Open final on Friday.
“Normally, you’re thinking on the court that she can’t play like this the whole match and she’s going to have a couple of games where she plays worse. But she didn’t. She was just playing the whole match so aggressive, with pretty much everything in, and I couldn’t do much. I was doing everything right and hitting the ball well but it was coming back better and better.
“I can’t even be angry with myself. What she was doing was unbelievable. It went too fast. Even when I started serving better, the ball was coming back stronger. Well done to her. I was playing good but she was playing amazing tennis and so aggressive, hitting it very deep, I couldn’t do much.”
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2017/jan/13/johanna-konta-australian-open-form-of-her-life
BTW, I’m eating humble pie right now after saying at the beginning of the week that Jo didn’t have the game to beat Aga 🙂
A terrific win from Jo today. I only saw the highlights but I love the way Jo just crushed Aga’s serve, at 5:26 and 6:02 in this video;
As a sidenote, it’s interesting too to see the symmetry between this final and their last final in Beijing; that one also ended with the same score (6-4, 6-2 to the winner) and with an ace.
Jo surely goes into the AO next week as a player whom no one will want to face.
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I’ve been high on Konta but I went against her for the last two rounds in Sydney. She looked sensational in the highlights.
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