stretches our sights long enough, we will find that history is always circulating in reincarnation. In the past few decades, the development and changes of the world's women's tennis are a clear proof.
Tennis entered the Open era in 1968. Agile and dexterous play is the mainstream of women's tennis, and the distribution of Grand Slam champions is also relatively scattered. After the 1980s, Navratilova pioneered a violent style of play, which made women's games appear masculine. This "female King Kong" opened a terrifying era of monopoly.
After "Female King Kong" retired, the agile and dexterous style of play that does not rely too much on violence has resurfaced. The most important representatives are "Swiss Princess" Hingis, "Belgian Double Shu" Heining and Kristels .
When the big and small powers rose, the violent style of play came again. From winning the U.S. Open in 1999 to winning the Australian Open in 2017, Serena won 23 Grand Slam titles. After his postpartum comeback, Serena won 4 Grand Slam runners-up and 1 quarter-final. In 20 years, Serena's state has fluctuated, but she is still a well-deserved "queen" in women's tennis.
Serena’s “power” is not inferior to ordinary men. The biggest difference between her and men’s players lies in her mobility and physical reserves. Serena in the heyday is very good for many WTA female players. Compared with men’s "dimension reduction blow" to women. During the
, we can also see the tenacious defense of Wozniacki, Kobel, Ala and others. However, no matter how airtight the bottom line is to defend, no matter how difficult the brown sugar play is, most of them will be defeated in front of Serena who has absolute speed and strength. After
gave birth to a child, Serena's state has declined significantly. In the 2018 U.S. Open finals, Naomi Osaka, who regarded Serena as an idol and "mother" since childhood, defeated Serena Serena. This can be regarded as a landmark event for the end of Serena's rule.
Along with Serena's retirement, women's tennis "water overflows with golden mountains" is also increasingly popular. The past 15 grand slams of women's tennis were divided by 12 people. The distribution of championships has never been so scattered. It is no wonder that people exclaimed that women's tennis is "parallel imports". If you compare this era with the previous era, it seems to be very similar to the era before Serena or Navratilova. When tennis lacks dominant figures, it won't be surprising that anyone wins a Grand Slam.
This also adds a new aspect to the tennis game. Every time the championship prediction before the Grand Slam becomes very difficult, you don't know who will become the dark horse and who will win the cup for the first time in the Grand Slam final.
Now, the question before us is-who will be the next leader?
Batty, Halep, Kenning, Svitolina, Karp? These few seem to be able to defend but not enough offensive firepower. Andrescu, Kvitova, Bertens, Sabalenka? These guys are indeed okay, but they always feel a bit worse than Serena, and the stability is not satisfactory. No one has been able to have a stable performance in six months, one year or even two years. Will
be Muguruza? In the 2016 French Open women's singles final, the sturdy Muguruza won the first Grand Slam trophy with a violent style of play. I was very optimistic about this Spanish and Venezuelan mixed player. Unexpectedly, Muguruza was out early in the second round of Wimbledon and the US Open, and was labeled "Grand Slam Syndrome".
Grand Slam quarterfinals are one of the most important indicators for testing players. In 2017, Muguruza's condition improved slightly. She reached the quarter-finals at the Australian Open, won the second Grand Slam trophy at Wimbledon, and reached the semi-finals of the French Open in 2018.
In 2020, Muguruza broke into the Australian Open final and lost to Kenning. She basically had no understanding of Kenning's defense. In the end, she won the championship with a goodbye double error. Later, the US Open lost to Pironkova in the second round, and the French Open lost to Collins in the third round. Based on last year's performance, Muguruza still has time to fully recover. If
must look for the next "Queen" like Serena, then the most likely character is obviously Naomi Osaka.
benefited from the excellent sports genes of black people, and Naomi Osaka's explosive power and endurance are quite good, which gives her a natural advantage against white European and American girls. Although Naomi Osaka's serve and forehands are slightly slower than Serena Serena, he has basically acquired Serena's nine success.
is even more valuable. Naomi Osaka has a maturity and stability that is not commensurate with her age. She is emotionally stable, strong mental willpower, and not susceptible to external interference when facing pressure. A typical example is the 2018 U.S. Open women's singles final. Naomi Osaka, who entered the Grand Slam final for the first time, played very steadily. Even if there were many accidents of Serena's "big scene", Naomi Osaka remained unmoved. From start to finish, all of Naomi Osaka's technical projects are in a very stable state, and even his expression is very calm and composed.
In addition, Naomi Osaka is also keen on social activities. She is actively involved in the black affirmative movement. This year, the action of seven masks at the US Open has won widespread praise. The good results on the field and the good reputation off the field have brought great returns to Naomi Osaka. In terms of economy, Naomi Osaka set a new global female athlete's annual income record with 37.4 million U.S. dollars in 2019; in terms of influence, Naomi Osaka, who has a young and cross-cultural background, has captured a large number of fans and is regarded as a new idol.
Naomi Osaka's nationality is Japan. After she surpassed Li Na to become the leading figure in Asian women's tennis, Chinese fans have a somewhat subtle psychological feeling about her, which is mixed with many complicated emotions that are not easy to speak, but everyone understands.
For Serena, whether people like her or not, she can’t stop her from becoming a “Queen of the Ball”. After nearly 4 years of chaos in the "water flooding", women's tennis has obviously reached the era of a new "after ball" debut. Similarly, no matter what you think of Naomi Osaka, she will be one of the most popular candidates to succeed the "after ball". (Source: House of tennis: Yunjuanyunshu)
