The Dilemma of Ash Barty vs Top 20 Opponents

This image is a derivative of Sydney International Tennis WTA Premier Sydney,
by Rob Keating (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Ash Barty lost in the fourth round of a major tournament for the second straight time this week. 

She lost to Wang Qiang at the U.S. Open after falling to Alison Riske at Wimbledon. Twice, Barty was in position to meet Serena Williams in a major quarterfinal. 

Twice, she failed to win that last match which would have set up a big-league showdown.

The disappointment of not facing Serena on a huge stage is natural. The mere ability to play Serena in that situation likely would have carried value for Barty, regardless of the actual result. Great players generally get better precisely because they play other great players… not because they avoid them.

Barty shouldn’t be massively disappointed by this loss to Wang in New York. In this North American hardcourt swing, she never unfurled the level of form she displayed at Roland Garros and then in the grass season. 

Call it a hangover effect; call it the “stop and start” challenge of a tennis player who tries to reset after a huge moment in one’s professional life; call it the normal process of riding the highs and lows of a tennis season.

Whatever you want to call it, Barty’s loss to Wang – like her uneven hardcourt swing – puts her in a very unusual position.

Barty is simultaneously a player who has made bigger gains in 2019 than any other WTA professional (with one or two possible exceptions), but also a competitor who has elicited doubts about her ability to remain at the top of the sport.

Naomi Osaka’s loss means that Barty will be World No. 1 after the U.S. Open. No other player can top her point total. Osaka actually fell to No. 3, with Karolina Pliskova at No. 2.

Yet, while being No. 1 AND a major champion (which a few former World number ones never achieved, such as Dinara Safina), Barty still faces a few significant questions.

This tweet points to those questions:

The ability to go through elite players in big tournaments is something great players have to be able to prove and retain if they are to be remembered as legends of the game, and not merely as players who got lucky that one time and pocketed a single major title.

On #TennisTwitter, plenty of people throughout the world doubt that Ash Barty will maintain her place at the top of the sport.

Many people feel Barty – despite her World No. 1 ranking – is more like a top-15 player than a top-five player. It is precisely because of the tweet above mentioning Barty’s dismal record against top-20 opponents at the majors.

<ad>

Barty has many years to give to tennis, so her tennis clock isn’t ticking with urgency the same way it is for someone such as Karolina Pliskova, who will play only one more major (the 2020 Australian Open) before turning 28 years old).

Barty doesn’t face the pressure to win a major the way Kiki Bertens does. She doesn’t carry the burden of Julia Goerges, who is almost 31 and let a golden chance slip away at this U.S. Open against Donna Vekic. (Goerges had match point on her serve and let the match slide through her fingers.)

Barty, however, will certainly view her career as a journey which didn’t maximize its capabilities if she doesn’t win a second major. Winning Wimbledon is an obvious and central goal. Winning any second major, though, transforms a career almost as much as winning a first major.

Ask Simona Halep about that topic after her title at Wimbledon a few months ago.

For Barty to win that second major, she will probably have to go through more elite players than she did in Paris in late May and early June.

Yet, having said that, one can’t assume that top-10 and top-20 players will be part of ANY major-tournament path for WTA players these days. Barty could very realistically make her way to a second major title with a draw similar to 2019 Roland Garros.

At this U.S. Open, do you know off the top of your head how many of the top 12 seeds reached the quarterfinals? Two: Elina Svitolina (5) and Serena Williams (8).

At Wimbledon, do you remember how many top-10 seeds made the quarterfinals? Two: Svitolina (8) and Halep (7).

At Wimbledon, FOUR unseeded players (therefore, players ranked outside the top 32) reached the quarters.

WTA major-tournament seeds don’t have much of any bearing on outcomes these days. If Svitolina does not win this U.S. Open, each of the last three women’s major champions will have been seeded No. 7 or lower.

Is it likely that Ash Barty will have to go through tougher players to win her second major and build on what she has achieved in 2019? Yes!

Yet, that is far from a guarantee.

Ash Barty doesn’t have to worry first and foremost about beating players with certain levels of rankings or credentials. She merely needs to give first priority to restoring her game to the level we witnessed in Miami and Roland Garros.

The rest will take care of itself.

Did you enjoy this article? Leave a comment below, or join the conversation on the Stats Insider Twitter or Facebook page.