By Richard Pagliaro | Wednesday, January 20, 2016
"Coming into this match I was pretty confident that I could beat Petra," Daria Gavrilova said.
Photo credit: Mark Peterson/Corleve
Australian tennis is commemorating a departure and celebrating an arrival at this Australian Open.
While former Aussie men's No. 1 Lleyton Hewitt will close the curtain on his playing career after his record-extending 20th Oz Open appearance, future Aussie women's No. 1 Daria Gavrilova is making an energetic breakthrough on the Grand Slam stage.
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The 39th-ranked Gavrilova swept two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova, 6-4, 6-4, on Margaret Court Arena, to advance to the third round of a major for the first time in her career.
The Moscow-born, Melbourne resident played with poise on her home turf.
Kvitova failed to survive the second round for the fifth time in eight Melbourne appearances. Her home-town opponent saw vulnerability in the explosive left-hander and worked to expose it.
"Coming into this match I was pretty confident that I could beat Petra," Gavrilova said. "I knew that she didn't have enough matches before. She didn't even play anything before Oz Open. So I thought it was a good chance."
Quickness around the court, a jolting forehand and a serve that is bigger than her 5-foot-5 frame suggests are all assets for the former junior world No. 1. But it's Gavrilova's high-energy exuberance and love of a good fight that make her popular among Aussies, including two-time Grand Slam champion Hewitt.
"I like the way (Daria) goes about it," Hewitt said. "I saw her in the gym a lot in the pre-season. She works extremely hard. I think she's got a lot of good things ahead of her."
The 21-year-old Gavrilova launched the season flying high in Perth where she partnered Nick Kyrgios to lead Australia to the Hopman Cup before a wildly enthusiastic crowd.
"My preparation couldn't be any better than what it was," Gavrilova said. "Perth was an unreal experience. Obviously having those four matches under my belt, yeah, it couldn't be better. And I'm pretty confident now. I already lost two matches. Like, it helps."
So does the support of Aussie fanatics, though sometimes, Gavrilova confessed, she tried to tune out the crowd to hear the voice in her head.
"I (heard the fans) for sure. But sometimes I was not listening to it because I was trying to concentrate on things I wanted to do," Gavrilova said. "Well, I get distracted pretty easily."
She also draws inspiration facing elite players. Gavrilova raised her record against Top 10 opponents to 4-9, including an upset of five-time Grand Slam champion Maria Sharapova in Miami last March. The 39th-ranked Gavrilova is on pace to surpass world No. 27 Samantha Stosur, who fell in the first round, as the top-ranked Aussie woman.
Coached by former Aussie pro Nicole Pratt and Craig Tyzzer, Gavrilova thrives off pace and can play aggressive baseline tennis even against bigger hitters.
"When you watch her play, she’s serve and first shot, she’s always looking for forehands and her backhand is rock solid," Pratt told Aceland Australia. "So when she plays people now, they don’t know where to go on the tennis court with her."
The former US Open junior champ faces an old junior rival next, 28th-seeded Kristina Mladenovic. The pair once squared off in the Roland Garros junior final with Mladenovic coming out on top.
"There are so many (young) girls now coming through," Gavrilova said. "But already this week there are a few in the third round. It's great. We're all excited. We're all pretty friendly. We hang out together. Yeah, like I said, we're all supporting each other. I think it's going to be awesome."