I watched the WTA Adelaide International 2020 final between Ashleigh Barty & Dayana Yastremska and was pretty impressed with Barty's variety and all-court play. She played the final to perfection; deliberately mixing it up and not giving power to negate her opponent's favored returns. Her backhand slice in particular seemed to muddle Yastremska's balance and returns; and she engineered an overall game plan that served to pull her opponent all over the place.
For Yastremska; you can see the talent in her; but she was overall too naive in her game; and she failed to balance aggression with control; spraying countless unforced errors to hand the game to her opponent. There was also an interesting part in her dialogue with her coach Sascha Bajin; when she was complaining about her "many unforced errors" like a spoilt 19-year old; until you realised that she is indeed 19 years old lol.
For Barty; you can see why she is the reigning world no. 1; she doesn't hit with tremendous power; but what she has is a good and reliable serve; a consummate variety in her game and an all-court awareness and intelligence that makes her very hard to stop. She also has a top-notch demeanour; always concentrating and never getting too high or too low whatever the point happens. Another thing: it looks like she makes NO mistakes in her game; and that is so hard to do even for top players.
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