Pavy’s run in Paris

Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova had a career best week in Paris last week. The Russian beat 3 top ten players on her way to the Premier title. The tennis review looks back at her run.

Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova’s victory in Paris last week was welcomed warmly by the tennis world. The 22 year old is still relatively young by today’s tennis standards when 30 plus year olds win Majors and there is a lack of young champions coming through and winning titles. Why that matters is a whole different issue but the fact is any young players who can show the mentality and physical strength to win Premier titles, if they can stay injury free and keep improving, has a bright future when the current crop of Major winners retire.

Pavlyuchenkova has threatened to break through before. Quite grandly at times. In 2011, she led eventual champion Francesca Schiavone 5-1 in the third set in the quarter-finals before youth and her opponent got the better of her. And last year she made the final in Brisbane before losing to Serena. But each seeming progression in her career has been followed by a slump, chiefly down to two factors: one, a lack of fitness and, two, her errors outnumbering her winners by concerning ratios.

Her run in Paris though is by far her biggest statement yet. Beating Kerber 7-6 in the third in the last eight was monumental. Kerber is not at her best but few women are as consistent on the tour and getting past her requires some discipline.

Next up was the big defeat of Sharapova. Maria, too, is out of sorts, but she is a four time Major champion and had swept through her part of the draw to the loss of 5 games. Pavyluchenkova proved to be a good match up and had the Russian beaten from the back of the court in a nervy contest.

The final though was the big test. It would have too easy to get a big scalp like Sharapova’s and then have a letdown. And Errani may not be much of an indoor player but she is ranked in the top ten, has a ton of experience and knows how to win big matches. Pavlyuchenkova seemed eager to help her win this one, hitting errors galore in the first set, but once she cut them down and started to play her big game of first strike tennis, her attack outdid the Italian’s defence and the title was the Russian’s.

Another Russian broke through at the Paris Open de Gaz tournament in 2005. Her name was Dinara Safina. She beat Amelie Mauresmo in the final. She went on to become world number 1 and a three time Major finalist. No small shakes indeed. Let’s see if Pavyluchenkova can follow in her formidable footsteps.