Excerpt from the Kerber book: "Angie, we'll just make the best of it!"
Angelique Kerber celebrated her first big triumph at the Australian Open in 2016. We look back - with an exclusive excerpt from the autobiography "Angelique Kerber: A Question of Will - My Way Up".
by Angelique Kerber
last edit: Jan 25, 2023, 06:41 pm
I saw the match ball in my mind's eye for the umpteenth time. Like in slow motion, but this time I got a bird's eye view of the square. I was leading 5:4 in the third set after 2:08 hours, had an advantage, my first chance to end the match. Serve Serena. Please no ace!, I thought – and said to myself: “Bring the ball back into the field somehow. Somehow.” It worked. I was able to return your service through the middle. Williams went to the net after her next shot, was there with everything she had to offer. Red alert despite what might be the greatest tennis player of all time wearing bright yellow that night. I went full on with my backhand. Serena's wrist forehand volley went long. Always longer. Zuuuuu laaaaang. I stared mesmerized at the ball bouncing past the baseline.
From that moment on, my life was divided into a before and an after. irrevocable. At that moment, however, I had no idea what was going on. My thoughts revolved around completely different things, around obvious truths that made me overjoyed deep down: After so many attempts, I finally managed to keep my nerve until the very end, until the very last rally. hide everything. With the latent fear in the neck, everything could still turn out to be a bad prank. But it was real.
I now felt again how my body suddenly trembled with all these indescribably intense emotions after the match point. I threw my racquet off me, fell onto my back, started sobbing softly, clasping my face in my hands. At that moment I was alone with myself, he still seemed dangerously fragile, but still swept me away like a force of nature. I didn't resist - and was rewarded with great calm. Everything around me became silent and dark. It was only seconds, but it felt like an eternity. my little eternity
The cheers of the 14,500 or so spectators brought me back to reality. Serena suddenly appeared in front of me. As the? She must have come over to my side by now. A great gesture from her. She hugged me and whispered in my ear how happy she was for me. It sounded sincere. I took every word from her, at least the effort not to let the disappointment show at the moment. Because I saw her in her eyes, clearly. Either way, she was a competitor unlike any other in the history of tennis. An icon that catapulted the sport into new spheres and paved the way for a whole generation of players. Because of her, the stage in tennis had grown, which I also benefited from. Without Serena, the attention given to tennis wouldn't be the same. Her passion for the sport was unique, her will to win legendary. Losing was simply not an option. But that evening she proved to be a fair loser.
When I finally sat on my chair in the darkened arena before the award ceremony and had to smile again and again in a surge of joy, pride and amazement, the past few weeks passed by in fast motion.
A blow to the head...
A few days before the start of the tournament, a wooden slat from the ceiling paneling fell on my head in the middle of the night. My heart skipped a beat, I actually panicked because I thought someone was in the room. The bump on the upper right half of my forehead accompanied me for almost the entire event. Nobody noticed because I hid them under my hair.
Luckily it wasn't a wooden beam that could have almost killed me, and I might not even have been fit for a tournament. I spent the rest of the horror night with my head at the foot of the foot because I no longer trusted the disguise high above me. I could hardly sleep, I kept imagining what could have happened. Concussion, hole in the head, eye injury.
In the first days of the tournament I experienced a rollercoaster ride of emotions. Worse: actually, after the first lap, I was already back on the plane on the way home. With a depressing defeat in their luggage. In the opening match against Misaki Doi, number 64 in the WTA ranking at the time, I, seeded in seventh place, had match point against me in the tie-break of the second set. A key moment. However, the Japanese missed the return after my serve. What would have happened if that hadn't happened? Maybe I wouldn't play at all anymore. It wasn't just in 2011 that I thought about quitting, this thought kept coming back to me when things weren't going the way I wanted, when the effort was too great. Defeats are more brutal in tennis than in football, for example. Also because you are alone on the pitch and the impact of a disappointing setback is not spread over several shoulders. She only hits you. Often to the core. Hardly anyone can imagine how hard it really is. In addition, weekly losses in tennis are the rule rather than the exception. Even the best players on tour only win a fraction of the tournaments they play in.
And first-round games can be hell. The pressure is immense; there are my own expectations, those of my family, the sponsors I've had in the meantime, the press. But the fatal thing is: If you make it through the first round, the fear of embarrassment decreases, but the pressure just shifts and takes on a different form. The general expectations are rising and the pressure from outside is increasing. The rules apply to everyone on the tour, only the handling and mechanisms differ. No one is immune, only the best know how to deal with it reliably and to mobilize all their strengths in the face of the challenge and call them off to the point. Like a mountaineer who, on the steep, arduous way up, suddenly, on the home stretch, feels this irrepressible power to be able to sprint to the summit. Despite the thin air around him. In this phase of ease, limits can be exceeded that are unthinkable in training.
My frustration was huge because of the narrow win against Doi. During the subsequent cooling down on the ergometer, I said to Torben: "If I play another game like this the day after tomorrow, we can fly home straight away."
But we didn't have to pack our things yet. It got better from lap to lap, I was amazed at my own fitness. The quarter-final against Victoria Azarenka at least had the effect of a small "click". I had never won against her, the Belarusian power player, in six duels before - this time it worked. Hard to believe that I had beaten this nemesis.
A good omen? Anyway, my self-confidence continued to grow. Instinctively I seemed to know how to play the important points, trusting myself blindly. Everything was easy for me, everything seemed so natural to me. The bat acted as an extension of the arm, the ball obeyed and became an ally. The perspective that changed was also wonderful. At the beginning of the tournament, the access to the tunnel was rather small like a mouse hole, it got bigger and bigger from match to match, more and more a gigantic entrance gate through which you were guided unerringly as if on rails. I finally found myself in the flow, I was completely with myself, everything went effortlessly. Almost like a blissful high. And this whirlpool of positive energies washed me up to the final.
It was my first Grand Slam final. The fact that Serena Williams, the undisputed number one in the tennis universe, was waiting there made the challenge almost perfect. But at first there was no trace of anticipation. On the contrary. The evening before my biggest match to date threatened to be a complete disaster. I suddenly felt a deep sadness when I realized that neither my mother nor my sister, nor my grandparents, relatives or friends would be able to witness this game, which was so unique for me, live in my box. Actually, they had all promised to be there if I ever reached a Grand Slam final. But now – in Australia of all places, around sixteen thousand kilometers from home, more than twenty-one hours of pure flight time, at the other end of the world – the hurdle of the long journey was almost insurmountable.
Especially since a triumphant victory against Serena with a guaranteed happy ending was realistically a long way off. The duel with her could be over quickly, as a final debutant I had to reckon with everything. The effort was disproportionate, which I could rationally understand. Emotionally, however, I was devastated. So much so that I retreated to my hotel room and buried my face in the pillow.
"Where are you, what's wrong?"
An incoming WhatsApp ended my gloomy thoughts for the time being. It was from Torben, who asked where I was. In the midst of all the gloom, I forgot our dinner date together. "I'll be right there," I typed into my smartphone. But again I couldn't hold back the tears. It got later and later. "Where are you, something is wrong?" Torben then wrote, noticeably worried - and: "Shall I order something for you?" Shortly afterwards he called me via the house phone, the food was already on the table in the hotel restaurant. He sensed that something was very wrong.
"Are you okay?" he asked me as I joined dinner after an hour and a half delay. Without me having to elaborate, he understood where my frustration was coming from. It could not be changed, the topic of the upcoming final came back into focus.
"I can hardly believe it," I said quietly, as if I were speaking more to myself, "that after all this up and down in recent years, after such a long dry spell in a Grand Slam game, I'm in the final ."
"Rightly so," said Torben. "You're delivering world-class performance right now, you're playing superbly, like unleashed. It's no coincidence that you're in the final and swept everyone else away - you'll beat Serena too, I guarantee you that."
"And what's our plan, how should I do that tomorrow?" I asked before adding: "Nice, how easy you imagine it to be." I was a little more balanced again. All the loved ones at home, they wouldn't be a minute from mine
miss the final. A big consolation.
"Angie, we'll just make the best of it!" Torben said euphorically. I could tell by the look on his face that he meant it. Where did he always get his boundless optimism from? I nibbled on a single lettuce leaf. I wasn't hungry. Not the best preparation, tending towards a zero diet shortly before the finale, but the lesser evil due to my nervous stomach.
Torben's smile disappeared. "You don't need a plan. It's your run, you don't have to turn off your head, it's turned off. The best thing that can happen to you. Just play boldly. Don't back down."
"But Serena is so strong!" I said out loud, silently elaborating on the thought to myself. I had proven my strengths in the last two weeks. If I managed to play my game, then anything was possible. The belief in it had matured in me over the past few days and is now firmly anchored. Serena was under a lot of pressure too, there was a way to throw her off if I wasn't freezing in fear of her. The awe of her achievements had to remain in the dressing room, at no point could I allow it to enter my head.
Waking up the next day I felt surprisingly fresh and aggressive. Already after breakfast I had started to play through the match against Serena in my head and I noticed how this very special mode set in: I believed in myself and all doubts vanished. At noon I strolled along the Yarra River before heading to the facility in the afternoon. When it hit the hall at 4 p.m., Serena was playing right next to me, she on court 17, I on court 16. If I glanced over at her, I couldn't see any signs of nervousness on her part, instead there was a big rush of all kinds of people. Was actually clear. She appeared highly focused and challenged her hitting partner to come to the net on short balls. When he didn't understand at first, she repeated her request in a serious voice.
Just enjoy, that's far too little for me
When she finished her unit, she disappeared with her entourage to great cheers from the many spectators. A little later I left the court, a few isolated German journalists who had been watching me called out to me: "Enjoy it tonight."
They meant well, it was meant to be encouraging, but I guess they believed I was going to come out the match as the loser, since I was the blatant underdog. I just nodded and thought to myself: If only they knew what I'm really up to. Just enjoy, that's far too little for me.
In the rush that broke out, I didn't get to eat again, but I wouldn't have eaten anything anyway. I had to cough and sneeze, always alternating, probably just a reaction to the situation, not the beginning of a cold that I didn't need at all now. And even if I did, I would go to the square with a fever, a cast and crutches.
And then the game started at 7:43 p.m.; the roof was open, the announced rain hadn't arrived yet. I started putting my plan into action. I ran like my life was at stake, played myself into a frenzy. I made mistakes, Serena made mistakes, but in the end at 21:52 I was the one who beat her in straight sets. What a triumph!
In the press conference that followed, I felt liberated, let my thoughts run free, the sentences literally flowed out of me. First English, then German, and finally Polish. I used to deliberately weigh every sentence, now the lightness dominated, the tension was finally over. Sparkling wine was served for everyone, meanwhile I kept talking, without a period or comma, not knowing what to do with my feelings, which I wanted to share with everyone and explain to everyone. When I was asked about the forthcoming media hype in Germany, I replied: "I'm really looking forward to it. I hope people in Germany are also looking forward to seeing me.”
My phone rattled like a slot machine coin box after the jackpot was hit. I would only find the peace and quiet two days later on the plane to read the love storm in the form of news from all over the world.
#IMG2#
Angelique Kerber: A question of will - My way up was published by EDEL Sports and is available from the publisher or your trusted bookstore.