Miami Open presented by Itau
Women’s Final: [CR1] Serena Williams (USA) vs. [CR12] Carla Suarez Navarro (ESP)
Williams gets her eight Miami Open trophy against a player she has dominated; however, the first set was not her best performance. Her footwork remained questionable and she continued to struggle with the rhythm on her groundstrokes; yet, Suarez Navarro still could not take the set. It is not really the other player across the net that Williams battles. The problems that Williams continues to have on court are created by the internal dialogue between the tennis player and the perfectionist that she is. She wants to win every match perfectly; yet she is aware of how improbable that is. This unrealistic demand creates so much stress and negatively impacts her game. She loses the fluidity of her strokes and becomes stagnant. The second set was a significant improvement in the quality of her tennis and Suarez Navarro just looked baffled. How do you believe that you can defeat a player you have never beaten? Doubting her ability to defeat Williams, Suarez Navarro could not mount much resistance in the second set. Suarez Navarro leaves the court once again unable to find the answer to defeating Williams and collects another 0-6 set. After a rather hesitant start, Williams gets the 6-2, 6-0 victory.
Suarez Navarro’s game has improved over the past few matches, I thought she might give Serena a little trouble. However, it was evident about half way thru the first set that this was not to be. At least Serena showed up for this match as opposed to the way she performed during the match against Lisicki where, despite her win, she appeared lifeless and out of sorts. The second set was an absolute disaster for poor Carla. Maybe next time. I’m sure they will meet again.
Perhaps Carla Suarez Navarro let the memory of all her losses to Serena distract her from the knowledge that she has been playing much better tennis of late. Unfortunately, Serena did not give her much time to think and before she could re-group and possibly challenge Serena, she had loss the match. I do think they will meet again. I am also quite curious to see if Suarez Navarro will find a way to overcome the challenge that Serena presents.