TENNIS – Following a turbulent couple of years Andrea Petkovic won the WTA tournament in Charleston. After breaking into the Top 10 in 2011, Petkovic suffered from a variety of injuries, one happening on her way of recovery during Porsche Tennis Grand Prix. Now, she has definitely set her eyes on reaching this year’s Fed Cup finals with the German team around Barbara Rittner. Simone Kemler
“I’m going to have champagne and I don’t even drink champagne, but I’m just going to have it for the heck of it in the airplane. I’m going to get drunk I never get drunk on the airplane. That’s what I’m going to do, and I’m going to walk around and dance with the cabin attendants. That’s what I’m going to do.” If you have already had the pleasure to experience Andrea Petkovic in various press-meetings, you know her vibrant, honest and lively of commenting her tennis, that is why it cannot be astonishing to hear her plans after securing her third title on the WTA-tour in Charleston. And it has been a turbulent couple of years for former Top 10 playerAndrea Petkovic. The German took part in an dream week in Charleston, where she defeated fellow-countrywoman Sabine Lisicki, Lucie Safarova, Eugenie Bouchard and Jana Cepelova to lift her third title on the tour and her first since 2011.
After breaking into the Top 10 in 2011, Petkovic suffered from a variety of injuries, one happening on her way of recovery during Porsche Tennis Grand Prix straight in front of her home crowd in Stuttgart. At that time there were many doubts of fans and interested parties that presumed Petkovic having started competing again too early, and as a result of all this, her ranking plummet to a low of No. 177 last March. Now, Petkovic credits her return to her technical developments over the past two years. “I got technically much better after my injuries,” the German said. “You always have to see the good and the bad somehow, and the good thing about my injuries was that I knew I couldn’t rely on my fitness only after all these injuries. I wasn’t able to practice as much as I used to before, so I needed to develop technically, and I needed to develop my game.”
The current world No. 28 recalled the lowest point in her career, the 2013 French Open, where she failed to qualify for the event after losing to a player ranked outside the World Top 160. While she was close to calling it a career on several occasions, she persevered through the trials and tribulations and is thankful to reap the benefits of her hard work. “I think the lowest, lowest, low point was last year at the French Open when I lost second round qualis against a girl that was ranked maybe 160, and I played awful, and that’s when I wanted to stop,” Petkovic said. “Although I also wanted to stop after I lost the match against Giorgi in Indian Wells [this year], so I had a lot of these moments where I wanted to stop playing. But somehow I always kept doing what I did, and I kept not believing, but wanting it, I guess. That’s why I kept working, and I’m very thankful that it paid off in the end.”
Maybe her decisiveness to stick to tennis is a result of her ability to see ‘the big picture of life’. Andrea Petkovic is a bright multi-interested woman, who has for example already made experiences in politics during an internship at the regional government in Hesse. Also Sigmar Gabriel, present Vice-chancellor of Germany is said to be closely acquainted to her and she has repeatedly commented on wanting to play a role in politics and/or German society once she has retired from tennis for good.
But right now, she has definitely set her eyes on reaching this year’s Fed Cup finals with the German team around Barbara Rittner. In the past years Rittner has managed to form a team where several German players like Kerber, Lisicki, Görges, Barthel, Grönefeld and of course Andrea Petkovic press on getting this particular title. During the Easter weekend (19. – 20. April 2014), the ‘girls’ try to overcome the Australian team in their semi-final in Brisbane – of course it is a somewhat extra difficulty to go from the US via Europe all the way to Australia and then straight back to Germany because Porsche Tennis Grand Prix in Stuttgart is waiting. However, the German Fed Cup team is eager to win this rubber and when it comes to Andrea Petkovic: she will give it all, on court herself and off court cheering and supporting the team, if need be until her voice fades.
These are the teams of the Fed Cup tie Australia vs Germany to be held at Queensland Tennis Centre, Brisbane, Australia on outdoor hard-court: Aussie Captain Alicia Molik nominated Sam Stosur, Casey Dellacqua, Ashleigh Barty and Storm Sanders and Barbara Rittner took Angelique Kerber, Andrea Petkovic, Julia Görges and doubles-specialist Anna-Lena Grönefeld.
