By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Wednesday November 11, 2020
As the 2020 tennis season winds down Tennis Now is looking back on the movers, shakers and achievers. We begin our series with a look at Victoria Azarenka’s inspirational rise to prominence in 2020.
More 2020 Season in Review: Victoria Azarenka | Ugo Humbert | Iga Swiatek
What Made Azarenka’s Season Special?
Victoria Azarenka began 2020 in a state of flux and ended it as a woman on a mission, eager to continue the tangible growth that she had achieved over the course of the year.
The Belarusian had contemplated retirement, and parted way with her team at the end of the 2019 season, setting them free to look for other work because, she puts it, she didn’t feel that it would be fair to keep them hanging on when she didn’t know if she’d be moving forward with her career.
After a lot of soul-searching and the hiring of a relatively unknown coach named Dorian Descloix, Azarenka did move forward and the results were spectacular.
“I will say that I was ready to stop, definitely,” she told a reporter who asked her to talk about how close she came to calling it quits on her professional tennis career at this year’s US Open. “I said that before. I hadn't touched my racquet for five months. I was really not planning on coming to play until I had my personal issues resolved. So I never really made the final decision because I was going to do that after. So it was pretty close. But what kept me in the game is my desire to go after what I want. That's pretty much it.”
The 31-year-old won 18 of 24 matches, claimed her first title in over four years at the Western and Southern Open, and reached her first Grand Slam final in seven years at the 2020 US Open, where she fell to Naomi Osaka in three sets.
Azarenka was as good off the court as she was on. She spoke candidly and eloquently about her personal travails and how she had finally found the right mix to propel her back into the mix at the top of the game. Frequently, when asked if she was gaining confidence from the victories she was achieving, she would say that the confidence has to come first.
"My confidence wasn't built based on matches, it was built based on the work that I do and belief in the right things that I'm doing and the result was more of a confirmation rather than bringing me confidence,” she said.
What Was Her Greatest Achievement in 2020?
Azarenka’s US Open has to be her best achievement, because it had bene so long since she had played a Grand Slam finals, and also because she was able to finally defeat her rival Serena Williams at the Grand Slam for the first time in 11 tries. Azarenka achieved that feat in the semifinals, defeating Williams, 1-6, 6-3, 6-3, for just her fifth win over the American legend in 23 matches.
What Else Stood out about Azarenka in 2020?
Azarenka’s willingness to keep evolving as a player and a person made her one of the more inspirational figures on tour in 2020. She’s an articulate speaker who clearly gives a lot of thought to the way in which she lives her life. Though she’s proud to be one of a small cluster of mothers that are playing on the WTA Tour, she also wants to make it clear that she is more than just a mother.
“Being a mom doesn't win matches for me, I still have to be a tennis player to win matches,” she said. “I think that's an important role, but I hope that's not a full picture, that they're seeing, because being a parent is already a huger part, but also being able to do things for yourself is super important, and I think if we put less people in the boxes or identifications of who they are, it gives them more freedom to explore maybe more identities and more things that they can be, rather than 'Oh I'm just a tennis player, so you shut up and only talk about tennis,' or 'I'm just a parent so you only talk about parenting,' so there's not enough avenues to explore yourself.
"That's the reason why I don't want to talk about being in that box 'Oh it's a mom who won.' It's not. I am Victoria, I am a mom, I am also many things that I want to be, not necessarily recognized, but that's who I am, so I want people to see all those other things and I hope that that part is to maybe to some people, as inspiring as a mom playing a tennis match."
What Is Azarenka’s Year-End Ranking and How Many Titles Did She Win?
Azarenka finishes the year at No.13 in the world. She won one title, at the Western and Southern Open, which was her first title since 2016. She went 18-6 on the year and went 3-1 against the Top 10.
She also beat American Sofia Kenin, then ranked No.5 in the world, 6-0, 6-0 at Rome.
What’s Next for Azarenka?
This is the big question. Can Azarenka parlay all the success she achieved in 2020 into another big year in 2021? It certainly feels like she has turned a corner, based on her results and, perhaps more importantly, based on her desire to keep growing in every aspect of her game.
"In terms of the entire year, it's very positive,” she said after her final match of 2020, a loss in the final at Ostrava to Aryna Sabalenka. “There's a lot of positive things for me to take, more than I would say any other year, in combination with my game and approach and stuff, so yeah I'm definitely going to take some time off, regroup, restart, reset, take some quiet time, I think that's definitely needed.”