Laura Siegemund at the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix: Born to slide
Laura Siegemund once again played well at the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix - as almost always. Why is the WTA tournament in Stuttgart so important to you?
by Florian Goosman from Stuttgart
last edit:
Apr 22, 2022, 11:03 am
Laura Siegemund came to Stuttgart from a better starting position than in 2022. The Porsche Tennis Grand Prix is only her fourth tournament after her return, after a break of nine months after another operation on her right knee last summer.
Previous appearances? mixed. Two good match wins at the ITF tournament in Porto, a qualification failure in Lyon and a straight defeat after a rather mediocre performance in Miami, this is the record in singles so far (in doubles, of course: winning the tournament in Miami!). The 34-year-old also got off to a bad start on clay, beating Elena Rybakina 0-6, 1-6 in the Billie Jean King Cup last weekend.
In Stuttgart she is once again in the quarter-finals - what does the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix do with Siegemund, the sensational finalist in 2016 and surprise winner in 2017? "I just like playing in front of my home crowd," Siegemund explained after her surrender win against Maria Sakkari on Thursday , in which she had presented flawless tennis up to that point. As in round 1 against Tamara Zidanzek .
And then went into a fundamental analysis: "Of course I'm also a born clay court player, so I move well," says Siegemund, who is particularly well suited to the slightly different indoor sand with the hard substructure, as she further explained. "The surface here is extremely slippery, but I'm someone who doesn't mind and who still gets used to it relatively quickly. And moves well where others might have more problems." This "natural movement on sand" (Siegemund) is probably part of the secret of her success in Stuttgart; In addition, Siegemund naturally plays into the cards that for most of her competitors, the appearance at the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix is regularly the first of the year on red clay.
Incidentally, this also applies to her quarter-final opponent on Friday evening (from 5 p.m.), Liudmila Samsonova, currently number 31 in the world and recently with rather average results. In Stuttgart, however, with a win over Karolina Pliskova.
Of course, Samsonova and Siegemund know each other, "we trained a lot together at the Slams," says Siegemund.
Siegemund in top form: "It's nice when you see it afterwards"
Also striking: Siegemund looks physically fit. "Trained," she answered with a laugh when asked what she had done. The simple reason: After she first had to rest her knee and then slowly build it up again, i.e. could not walk much, she did a lot of upper body training, a lot for the torso. The six months of rehab have become more or less "six months of training".
Siegemund didn't seem to mind that she was asked about it both by on-court man Heinz Günthardt and in the press conference - on the contrary. "When you do so much," she explained with amusement, "then it's nice when you look at it afterwards."