A. Pavlyuchenkova b. D. Collins 2-6 7-5 6-1
It was the match between the two “intruders” in the 2019 Australian Open quarterfinals, the match looking to determine who would be this year’s unseeded player to get to the semifinals, as it has been tradition in this tournament for the past five years (in 2018 there were two unseeded players in the semis, Coco Vandeweghe and Mirjana Lucic-Baroni). Both outsiders on this occasion, although both with a very respectable ranking (n. 35 Pavlyuchenkova, n. 44 Collins), the two players come from very different backgrounds: the Russian girl is the wonder-child turned into an unkept promise, while the American is the humble working-class girl who grew up on the public grounds in St. Petersburg, Florida and turned pro almost by accident after a college scholarship at the University of Virginia.
Both nervous at the start of the match, Anastasia was the quicker out of the starting blocks, winning a marathon 17-minute 28-point game facing five break points. The Russian player’s more powerful groundstrokes allowed her to pull away early in the first set as Collins looked unable to find the angles to move her opponent and contrast the effectiveness of her firepower. In a flash, it was 5-1 Pavlyuchenkova, who then closed the first set 6-2 in 49 minutes.
But Collins did not break into the Top 50 by giving up at the first hurdle: thanks also to her opponent making a few more unforced errors, the Floridians was able to gain a 5-2 advantage by avoiding the rallies in the middle of the court and forcing her opponent to run side-to-side. But Pavlyuchenkova came back to 5-5 crushing some returns on Collins’ second serve and placed herself only two games away from her first Grand Slam semifinal. The match was tense, but the reaction from the scarce crowd on the stands was underwhelming: it felt like the struggle on court did not concern them, as they counted down the minutes to the “Barty party” in the evening. At 5-6 two loose unforced errors complicated Pavlyuchenkova’s service game from 30-0 up, and Collins managed to take home the second set with an inside-out forehand winner.
Crippled by the pressure of another semifinal chance that she felt was slipping away (Anastasia had already been in the quarterfinals at each Major before), the Russian player let herself be overcome by her very fears that prevented her to fulfill her destiny of glory in tennis and allowed Danielle Collins’ fighting spirit get the best of her. The American, on the other hand, grew up scraping for court time in the public parks of St Petersburg and became a tennis warrior during those NCAA team competitions where rowdy fans chant just a few feet from the court. Collins got to 5-0 in the third set in the blink of an eye, and when two games later her opponent’s last forehand return sailed past the baseline, she could celebrate her first Major semifinal only at her second attempt in a Grand Slam tournament’s main draw.
