WIMBLEDON – Ons Jabeur wiped away tears with a white handkerchief as she walked to her post-game press conference 1 1/2 hours after the fall 0-3 in the Grand Slam final by falling short Marketa Vondrousova in the Wimbledon final Saturday.
Jabeur called it “the most painful loss of my career” and was grateful for the comforting hug she received from Kate, the Princess of Wales, during the trophy presentation at Center Court – “Hugs are always welcome,” said the 28-year-old. said the aged Tunisian – and the comforting words she later heard from International Tennis Hall of Fame member Kim Clijsters, who was defeated in her first four major finals before winning the next four.
The 6-4, 6-4 setback against Vondrousova, the first unseeded woman to win Wimbledon, followed Jabeur’s losses to Elena Rybakina in last July’s All England Club final and to Iga Swiatek in the US Open final last September .
“You can’t force things. It shouldn’t be,” said Jabeur, the only Arab woman and only North African woman to make it to the last round in singles at a major tournament. “Hopefully I’ll be like the others who’ve failed a few times… and it’ll come after that.”
Her day got off to an awkward start: Jabeur showed up at the main stadium for the pre-game warm-up, dressed in black, in violation of the All England Club’s rules which require white dress to be worn on the competition pitches.
So she had to interrupt that batting session to get changed.
“It was just an honest mistake,” she said.
Jabeur was seeded sixth at Wimbledon, beating four former Grand Slam winners including Rybakina en route to Saturday.
But Jabeur said she was too tense against Vondrousova and the stats seemed to bear that out.
Her serve wasn’t good: only 48% of her first serves landed and she got broken half a dozen times.
She didn’t hit her backhand well: her 17 unforced errors on that shot alone were more than Vondrousova’s 13 total errors.
In all, Jabeur made 31 unforced errors.
No matter how hard she tried to relax through deep breathing, no matter how hard she tried to calm herself through small talks, it didn’t solve the problem.
“It’s painful,” she said, “because you feel like you’re so close to achieving something you want and actually[now]starting from scratch.”
Jabeur took a 4-2 lead in the first set but dropped 16 of the next 18 points.
Then she took the lead in the second set 3:1 and 4:3, but let this lead disappear again.
Now Jabeur will regroup and try to figure out how to get back to the most important game in the most important events of her sport.
She has established herself as one of the top players in women’s tennis, reaching three of the last five major finals.
And her 28 wins on grass over the past three seasons is the most since Maria Sharapova had 30 wins, including a Wimbledon title, from 2004-06.
“I will definitely keep learning and keep staying positive. I think that’s what will keep me going,” said Jabeur. “Otherwise it doesn’t do me much good if I get depressed about it.”
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Howard Fendrich has been the AP’s tennis writer since 2002. Follow him on Twitter at https://twitter.com/HowardFendrich
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AP Tennis: https://apnews.com/hub/tennis And https://twitter.com/AP_Sports
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