Whatever tips Andy Murray passed on to Heather Watson when the pair played for Britain in the recent Hopman Cup, they must have been good. The 22-year-old Briton won her second WTA Tour title when she triumphed in Hobart on Saturday and she will go into the Australian Open with a career-high ranking of 38 and a genuine belief that she can make some inroads.
Watson’s 6-3, 6-4 victory over the American qualifier Madison Brengle means she will rise 11 places in the rankings when the list is updated on Monday, although the ever-wary Watson said there would be no celebration until she sees it for herself. “Is that official?” she asked, when told she will exceed her previous career-high by one position. “I never like to guess because if it’s not then I won’t be as happy. I’m just going to pretend it will be, like, 45. When it is 38 I’ll be really happy.”
Watson is happy again and with good reason. Having fallen as low as No161 in the rankings last February, as she struggled to shake off the after effects of glandular fever, Watson fought her way back up to end last year just inside the world’s top 50. Playing with Murray in Perth was a great experience, she said, and set her up nicely for her run in Hobart, where she beat Sloane Stephens, a former Australian Open semi-finalist, Italy’s Roberta Vinci and then outclassed Brengle to win the title.
“It was a great week in Perth, I really enjoyed it,” she said. “Being there as Andy’s team-mate definitely gave me a boost of confidence. All my work that I did in the off-season and last year has just come together. I feel like I’m using everything to play good, positive tennis and I’m coming out with good results.”
When Watson won her first title, in Osaka, in late 2012, she was the first British woman to win a tournament at that level since 1988. At the time she found it tough to comprehend. More than two years on, she feels she deserves to be at this level. “I was just overwhelmed when I won my first title and so, so happy to win it,” she said. “This one felt more like I belonged here, this was where I should be. I really believed and backed myself to win it.”
Watson will get straight back down to business – she says she doesn’t drink champagne – as she prepares for a tough opening-round match in Melbourne against the talented Bulgarian, Tsvetana Pironkova. The pair have met four times, level at two wins apiece and though Watson won the most recent match, in Eastbourne last summer, she knows it will be tough.
“We always have really good, competitive long matches, so it won’t be easy,” she said. “I know she always likes playing in Australia. She’s done well in Sydney the past two years. I really look forward to it and I’ve already got my gameplan sorted out.”
After all Watson’s ailments in the last couple of years, crucially, she goes into Melbourne fully fit. Allied to her new-found attacking mindset, that gives her at least a fighting chance of making progress. “I feel so fit and healthy,” she said. “It’s really showed in my matches this week. I haven’t got really sore or tired in any of them. I’d say today was probably the most difficult. We had a lot of long, close points and games and I was able to come out on top even, when it did get really physical.”
As well as earning a new career-best ranking of No38, Heather Watson’s triumph made her the first British woman since Anne Hobbs in 1985 to win two WTA tour titles.
Hobbs’s victories came at Indianapolis in 1983 and Auckland two years later, aged 26. Watson, aged 22, has plenty of time on her side to improve on that. And here’s another challenge for Watson: the Nottingham-born Hobbs peaked with a world ranking in 1981 of No33.
Watson’s first title, in Osaka in 2012, ended a 24-year British drought that stretched back to Sara Gomer’s sole WTA trophy, in California in 1988.
