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In Wimbledon Loss, Karolina Pliskova Sees a Silver Lining

Bhupender SainiJul 11, 2021Sports
In Wimbledon Loss, Karolina Pliskova Sees a Silver Lining

WIMBLEDON, England — Karolina Pliskova was happy with how she had played in the Wimbledon final on Saturday, despite a disastrous start — she lost the first 14 points of the match — and the fact that it ended in a 6-3, 6-7 (4), 6-3 loss to Ashleigh Barty.

Where Pliskova disappointed herself, she said, was after the match. “I never cry — never!” Pliskova said as she began tearing up during the trophy ceremony. “And now?”

In her news conference more than an hour later, Pliskova said that she had “never had a better moment in my career” and that she had been “more sensitive than I normally am” after receiving enthusiastic support from the crowd and the runner-up plate from Kate Middleton, the Duchess of Cambridge.

“I feel like, OK, cry in the locker room, but not on the court,” Pliskova said, chiding herself further. “Somehow, I could not. The people, they cheered so much. Just too many emotions.”

Tennis, as Pliskova knows well, offers harsh extremes of success and failure. A total of 128 women start a draw, and that number is halved in each round until only one remains to hold the trophy. The other 127 leave as losers.

“We both tried to win, so somebody has to lose,” Pliskova said with a small shrug. “You have to accept that. I will, definitely.

“I know how to lose, believe me,” she added with a laugh. “I’m so good in that.”

Pliskova’s career is, by some cold metrics, disappointing. She has played in the main singles draw of a Grand Slam tournament 36 times, 21 of those as a top-10 seed, and has yet to win a title. In her one previous appearance in a final, at the 2016 U.S. Open, Pliskova led Angelique Kerber, 3-1, in the third set before the German surged back to win the title.

But Pliskova has also reached No. 1 in the WTA rankings, having spent eight weeks in the top spot in 2017, which proves to be a rarer achievement. Since the rankings began in November 1975, only 27 women have reached No. 1, while 51 women have won major singles titles.