Johanna Konta is as surprised as anyone familiar with her formerly fragile psyche to learn she is now the best player under pressure in women’s tennis – although opponents who have witnessed her rise through the rankings into the top 10 will need no reminding of her resilience.
According to a survey released here this week, the world No9 is tougher in the clutch points than even last year’s Australian Open finalists, Angelique Kerber and Serena Williams, both of whom are through to the second round with her.
Konta needed all her determination several times during a deceptively quick 7-5, 6-2 win over the world No70 Kirsten Flipkens that propelled the 25-year-old into a match against the excellent young Japanese prospect Naomi Osaka on Thursday.
“Really?” she laughed when told that the Tennis Australia Game Insight Group, a collection of sport science experts, had trawled a year of data and concluded Konta was the coolest player under stress among all entrants at this first major of the season.
Konta comes first with 65.8% of clutch serves made and 46.3% of returns, ahead of Williams, Garbiñe Muguruza, Dominika Cibulkova, Kerber, Ekaterina Makarova, Agnieszka Radwanska, Jelena Jankovic, Carla Suárez Navarro and Eugenie Bouchard.
Konta said: “Sorry, I don’t know why that’s funny but it makes me laugh! It’s a nice compliment, though, a nice stat to hear.” She added, between giggles: “Does it surprise me? I’m neither here nor there about it. I think every single girl you face is good at handling pressure. That’s part of why they’re successful on a regular basis from season to season and over a lot of years. They are incredibly good in tough situations. If you look at the likes of Agnieszka Radwanska and Svetlana Kuznetsova, they’ve been around a long time and been successful for a long time. That speaks volumes for them.
“But I guess being top of this list suggests what I’m trying to do is working. I’m constantly trying to be strong, to be calm when things get tough. The biggest part of that is keeping things in perspective, not being afraid of playing long matches, not putting too much pressure on yourself. It can’t be all or nothing, right here right now.”
That showed in her steady performance to grind down Flipkens over an hour and 36 minutes, as she acknowledged. “I know this sounds like a broken record for me but it’s about little battles. So each point accumulates and, if you do that well enough, you’ll get there. Take this match. She made it incredibly tough and has a real ability to frustrate an opponent. She’s been around a long time, so she has a bucketload of experience – and she used that.”
Konta may find 19-year-old Osaka, who is ranked 48 in the world and beat Thailand’s Luksika Kumkhum 6-7 (2-7), 6-4, 7-5 in the first round, a greener but more expansive opponent.
The British No1 recognises the danger because, as she has pointed out in the past, for a long time she was the hunter rather than the hunted. “When any player is playing someone who’s top 10, there’s a freedom that comes with that, so I’m now having to be ready for opponents who bring a new level, who come with inspired tennis. That’s a privilege I’m getting used to and hopefully I’ll have it for a long time to come.”
Osaka, who hits hard and accurately from a 5ft 11in vantage point, remembers losing to Konta in their only match – in two sets in qualifying at the 2015 US Open. “She had a real good serve and a really good return,” the teenager said. “I think it’s awesome how she rose so high and quickly. She’s a really good player. I look forward to playing her.”
Not that one of the Tour’s most individual and precocious talents is overawed. “She just won a tournament, so of course [she is] a threat. But I don’t know. I’m just going to try to see her as a player, and I’m a player, and we’re just going to try our best.”
Konta once was a bundle of doubts – which makes her transformation all the more admirable. The former British No1 Sam Smith remarked during the win over Flipkens that Konta’s many years of struggle have made a formidable opponent. Konta, almost reluctantly, agreed. “I think that’s the case in everyone’s career. It’s the trials and tribulations that really test a person, and coming through those difficulties is what shapes a person’s character. You don’t really know who you are until you’ve come through some difficulties on your journey. Every setback, as well as every positive, is something I take lessons from and absorb into every match I play.”
There have been many more ups than downs since she made the semi-finals here last year, ranked 47 in the world. Her progress won her the WTA’s most improved player of the year award and she has since grown in confidence, with a more aggressive, straightforward game. Against Flipkens, she hit 23 clean winners and won 20 points in 31 visits to the net.
Underpinning Konta’s growth has been a steadfast commitment to her core values such as family. Her sister, who lives in Sydney, where they were both born, has an eight-week-old baby and will not be making the trip to Melbourne to watch her play. Konta understands and supports that.
“I think it’s about the people around you – I’m very fortunate with my family and my team, and that it’s the fact that it’s all about the daily work we put in.
“Like I said to you here last year, I didn’t cure cancer. I’m just lucky enough to play a sport I love. I’m very blessed and fortunate, and that’s a pretty incredible career to have. As long as my focus remains one of just getting better all the time, there’s not much to get carried away with.”
Heather Watson says an encouraging British charge in the first round of the 2017 Australian Open, the best start since 1987, has had a mutually galvanising effect on one of the tournament’s smaller but still dangerous battalions that might yet reap further rewards.
The 24-year-old world No81 on Thursday seeks to get out of the second round against Jenny Brady, who took only 72 minutes to beat the experienced Swede Johanna Larsson 6-3, 6-2 in trying heat on Tuesday.
Watson, meanwhile, had a more demanding struggle beating Australia’s perennial underachiever on home soil, Sam Stosur, 6-3, 3-6, 6-0 in two and a quarter hours in a packed Margaret Court Arena that offered only end-of-court shade from the soaring mercury.
It followed Kyle Edmund’s 6-2, 7-5, 6-3 win over the Colombian world No91 Santiago Giraldo.
Watson said of the Monday successes of Andy Murray and Dan Evans: “It really motivates me when I see everyone winning on day one and then I followed Jo [Konta’s] match on that court today. I think it’s great and I use it to push myself. I try to keep up with them all now.”
Naomi Broady could not match the success of her compatriots and despite a gutsy performance was beaten 6-3, 4-6, 5-7 by the 22nd seed Daria Gavrilova of Australia.
Also on Watson’s side of the draw, is Serena Williams, who advanced with ominous ease by beating Belinda Bencic 6-4, 6-3, but admitted: “I made a few errors on some key points but, for the most part, I still was going for everything and I was able to close it out.”
The world No2, seeking a 23rd slam that would take her past the Open-era record of Steffi Graf, wore a T-shirt emblazoned with the word Equality and said later: “With today being Martin Luther King Day, it’s important to spread the message of equality, which is something he talked about a lot.”
Edmund, who looked good beating Giraldo, said he had no recurrence of the cramping problems that have hindered him in the heat here in the past. “It definitely wasn’t like I reached my limit after three sets,” he said. “If I needed to play another set I could have.”
In the second round, he plays Pablo Carreño Busta, the Spaniard seeded 30, who took nearly two and a half hours to beat the Canadian lucky loser, Peter Polansky, who retired in the fifth set.
