Women’s final – Serena V Kerber : 5 talking points

 The Australian Open women’s final between the German Angelique Kerber and Serena Williams turned out to be a mega blockbuster with great display of shot-making from both players.

To our immense surprise, Serena, who was the popular choice and was expected to win the title since she has a record of 21-4  in Grand Slam finals lost the match 4-6 6-3 6-4 .

Kerber won her First Grand Slam and became the first German to win a Grand Slam since the turn of the century.

What followed was not World War 3 but great sportsmanship spirit displayed by Serena Williams as she came around the net to congratulate her worthy opponent.

In this article we present to you the 5 talking points of the women’s finals

The Serena Williams serve is arguably the best shot in women’s tennis at this moment.

But in the final against Angelique Kerber, she put in just 53% of her first serves and won a meagre 69% points of it. She served 6 double faults and managed to hit only 7 aces

From the very beginning of the match, it was clear that Angelique Kerber had a clear mind and a plan to defeat Serena. Her brilliant stretch backhand cross-court winner in the third game sealed the break for her and even after getting broken in the 6th game she didn’t give up and broke Serena’s serve again. Despite losing the second set she didn’t suffer mentally and continued to play her game.

1. The 11 minute game
   
   
   
   

With Serena serving at 3-2 in the third set Angelique Kerber won perhaps the most crucial game of the match. It was an epic game with Serena hitting an uncharacteristic two double faults and Kerber hitting two brilliant drop shot winners.

Serena’s netplay was a total disaster,to say the least, in this match. At times she could have just watched and admire the passing shot from Kerber’s racquet .She won just 15 points out of the 32 times she approached the net.The last point was a testament to this fact as Serena missed a simple forehand volley to hand the German the Australian Open.

Kerber, for the most part of the match, rained behind the baseline and was made to run to and fro by Serena. Yet, she managed to hit most of the passing shots and made Serena go for the lines which made the World no.1 committed 46 unforced errors. She played perhaps the point of the match in the second game of the third set where she defended a Serena Williams smash before making a forehand passing shot.