A fighter to the finish, Petra Kvitova fended off four championship points before finally bowing to Naomi Osaka, 7-6 (2), 5-7, 6-4, in a spirited Australian Open final.
The two-time Wimbledon winner said she felt pain and pride after suffering her first Grand Slam final loss.
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The sting of defeat doesn't diminish Kvitová's courageous comeback from a brutal stabbing during a home invasion.
Though her bid to become the oldest woman to debut as world No. 1 was denied, the 28-year-old Czech will wake up on Monday with a career-high ranking of No. 2 empowered by her experiences.
"I'm not proud at all right now," Kvitova said with a smile. "No, definitely I am, for sure. It will be very bad if I'm not. So, yeah, as I said, it's hurting a lot today. I wanted to win and have the trophy. But I think I already won two years ago. So for me, it's amazing. I think I still don't really realize that I played the final.
"I think, I mean, I've been through many, many things, not really great ones. As I said on the court, I didn't know if I going to hold the racquet again. I'm holding it, so that's good.
"Still few things which I can improve, and we'll do it. So it's not the end. Yeah, I be back for sure."
Though the runner-up plate was not the silverware shehoped to hoist, Kvitova, who couldn't hold a racquet for weeks after undergoing a three-and-a-half hour surgery in December of 2016, has exceeded her expectations in a gripping comeback while earning global support for her grace.
Kvitova concedes her surgically-repaired racquet hand will never regain full fitness, but she's learned to thrive "trying to take the maximum from the minimum."
"I don't think I probably didn't really put kind of these high goals in my mind," Kvitova said of her comeback. "I never really put kind of this ranking-wise to my head. I wanted to be back on my greatest level probably as I played before. I knew it will be very, very difficult because my hand, it's not 100 percent, and never will be. It's just how it is. I'm just trying to take maximum from the minimum.
"Yeah, I feel great. I'm playing great tennis. I don't think that I could really imagine the time to be kind of this player again. So, yeah, great."
Photo credit: Mark Peterson/Corleve