Sunday, January 30, 2011
Associated Press
MELBOURNE, Australia
Kim Clijsters believes she’s now earned the nickname she had for years in Australia.
“I finally feel like you guys can call me ‘Aussie Kim’ because I won the title,” a teary Clijsters said after beating China’s Li Na 3-6, 6-3, 6-3 Saturday night to capture her first Australian Open. “It’s nice to finally get it this year.”
Clijsters lost the 2004 Australian Open final to Justine Henin and lost four times in the semifinals. This was Clijsters’ fourth Grand Slam tournament championship, but the first apart from the U.S. Open.
“To win it in this way means a lot,” she told a TV interviewer after the match. “This one to me is the one. When I think back on my childhood, I remember watching the Australian Open and seeing Monica Seles win many times. I think they used to go up into the stands. I remember her doing her speech there, and it was something that I was just amazed by. It seemed like such a fairy tale.”
Li was trying to become the first Asian to win a major, and the final was far from a smooth ride. She complained to the chair umpire about the Chinese fans and was bothered by photographers’ flashes in the courtside pits. The outbursts from all over the arena were jarring.
“They shouted ‘finish her off!’ sometimes even when we were hitting the ball,” Li said through a translator. “I thought, ‘How can they do this?”’
In doubles, Bob and Mike Bryan successfully defended their title, beating Indian stars Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi 6-3, 6-4 for their fifth Australian crown and 10th Grand Slam championship.
The Bryans have held the No. 1 doubles ranking the past eight years. They have also won the U.S Open three times and the French Open and Wimbledon once each.
Today, Andy Murray hopes to win his first major and end an almost 75-year drought for British men at the majors. He meets No. 3 Novak Djokovic.
Djokovic leads their head-to-heads 4-3, but has lost the last three. Djokovic is the favorite and won in Australia in 2008 — the last time neither No. 1 Rafael Nadal nor No. 2 Roger Federer was in the final.
Clijsters didn’t win her first major until 2005 — after she’d lost four finals. All the while, the Australian public regarded her as one of their own. And not only because she was once engaged to Lleyton Hewitt, the Australian who won two Grand Slam titles and was ranked No. 1 before Federer began his run. Clijsters is laid back and resilient, and the fans in Melbourne noticed.
“In the past year people have been so supportive,” she said. “They have been amazing and I really appreciate it. I always felt bad that I [didn’t] give something back — once I got to the final and lost to Justine — and now I feel maybe worthy to be ‘Aussie Kim.’”