The greatest of Bouchard’s talents just might be her nose for the victory. Bouchard, and her ATP comrade-in-arms Milos Raonic, are taking care of that nowadays in a big way. Canada has produced plenty of heroes, but none in tennis. She and her twin sister Beatrice were named after British royals, although they are native to Francophone Montreal. In fact, Halep is so self-controlled and calm on the court that in this day of shrieking WTA banshees, she seems a throwback to quieter if not better times.īouchard, by contrast, is the daughter of a successful investment banker. In that sense, she’s a bit like a WTA version of Lleyton Hewitt, but without the in-your-face theatrics. While that aggression has an enormous amount to do with Halep’s success, she is still most dangerous when she is counterpunching.
Halep felt obliged to remind her interlocutors, “But I play close to the baseline as well, and I'm aggressive. Following the quarterfinal win that brought Halep opposite Bouchard in the Wimbledon draw, there was much discussion of the way Bouchard likes to crowd the baseline. She reads the game as if it were a Dick and Jane book, and that enables her to exploit her chief asset, a gift for opening up the court by changing the direction of the ball. So much for the relentless drum of the idea that tennis will evolve to the point where most of the players have comparable physiques.Īs Serena Williams has said of Halep, “She serves so well for her height. The biographical detail is worth mentioning because it’s been critical to Halep’s success, and it flies in the face of the omnipresent theories that there is a specific body type most suited to tennis. It ultimately led to a jump of more than 450 places in the rankings.
The most improved WTA pro in 2013, Halep first came to notice for an unusual reason: At almost 18 years of age, she underwent breast-reduction surgery. She has become something of an icon in Romania, where her father, Stere, a former minor-league football player, owns a dairy-products factory.
It seems appropriate, because Halep certainly is the “constant” type-reliable, hard-working, and modest, she’s a thorough professional who also uses her tennis to express an abiding passion for her homeland. Halep still lives in the town of her birth, Constanta. They have split their two matches, with Halep winning at Indian Wells and Bouchard getting revenge at Wimbledon. However accurate those numbers, Halep obviously has a compact but solid, well-muscled body, while Bouchard skews more to the long and lean, like the woman to whom she is frequently compared every which way from Sunday, Maria Sharapova. Halep is just 5’6” compared to Bouchard’s 5’10”, at nearly identical weights. Their win-loss record is remarkably close: Halep was 36-10 after winning Bucharest on Sunday Bouchard is 36-14. Halep has won two titles so far this year, Bouchard one. She’s the only WTA player to have made the semifinals at every Grand Slam played so far this year, and was last seen taking a beating from Petra Kvitova with grace and composure on Wimbledon’s Centre Court-after dismissing Halep in the semis. 31, is now just four ticks of the computer behind Halep. Bouchard, who began the season ranked No. 3 after her run to the French Open final. Halep started the year with a ranking of No. Halep is in some ways the anti-Bouchard, but not to the point that it creates an image rivalry.
Bouchard is striking and supremely marketable-which, through no fault of her own, will rub many people the wrong way. Halep is a 22-year-old Romanian, two-and-a-half years older than Canada’s Bouchard but still part of the same generation. It doesn’t hurt that these two are chalk and cheese, despite sharing some similarities in style and critical statistical details. Other extremely talented girls, including Garbine Muguruza, Belinda Bencic, Donna Vekic, and Madison Keys, have also announced themselves this season, but none of them has enjoyed anything like the recent success of Halep and Bouchard. Thankfully, fresh talent is picking up the slack, none more quickly and artfully than Simona Halep and Eugenie Bouchard, who have emerged this year as the twin faces of a WTA youth movement. They may be aging as gracefully as Tina Turner, but they are getting older.
We’re in the midst of a major transition, as some of the most revered female players-women who are also, not coincidentally, vital to the high global profile of the WTA-are aging. Right now, the WTA boasts a cornucopia of talent. Will someone please tell these ladies they don’t have to bend over backwards to impress anyone? The WTA is so attractive and strong these days that when I see of those “ Strong is Beautiful” images appear in the background of the tour’s website, I can only wince.