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be brave
Go for it.
Madison Keys turned to those chants as she faced the most crucial points of her tennis career, stuck in the third-set cauldron of a 5-all, 30-all tie in the Australian Open final against the two-time defending champion. Arina Sabalenka on Saturday.
There was no reason to be anything but aggressive now, Key thought. There’s no reason to try to wish the nerves weren’t there with this moment. There’s no reason to worry — as the American long went from prodigy at age 12 to major champion less than a month before his 30th birthday — about what happens if things don’t quite work out.
“I just kept saying, ‘Be brave.’ And, ‘Go for it.’ I kind of just keep repeating that. That was really my goal for the day — just to be proud, win or lose,” Keys said in an interview with The Associated Press after winning his first Grand Slam title 6-3, 2-6, 7 at No. 1 Rod Laver Arena. -5 win against ranked Sabalenka.
“I went after it, every single point. And if I miss it and I don’t execute, I can live with that. I didn’t want to have any regrets that I was passive and that I missed out. (Then) it could have been something where I thought: ‘I should have done something else,’” Key said, clasping his hands as he recalled what happened nearly two hours earlier. “So I kind of just kept saying it over and over again.”
He spread the credit for his achievements. The team around her, which includes former players who have been her companions for years, her coach since mid-2023 and her husband since November. to her therapist, with whom she has spoken or texted frequently over the past two weeks. To his friends on tour who picked him up when he needed them.
They all believed in Key, he said, and now, lately, he believed in himself.
In his post-match press conference, Key discussed the ways his approach has changed.
Even she was concerned about living up to the hype that had accompanied her since her pre-teens, and it only escalated when she made her first appearance in a Grand Slam semifinal at Melbourne Park at age 19 (she lost to Serena Williams). He felt that nothing about his tennis career would matter if he could never claim a major trophy. She never felt at her best until her first Grand Slam final at the US Open at the age of 22 thwarted her (she lost to Sloane Stephens).
Finally, the key is to let all that go. It was okay not to obsess over other people’s opinions. It was okay if he never won a Slam. It was okay to face the nerves, because, after all, that’s how greats succeed – they feel uncomfortable but play through it.
“I’ve been nervous my whole career. So is Novak (Djokovic). So was Roger (Federer). Everybody has,” Frangelo, a former player who looked red-eyed when Key accepted his trophy, said during the tournament. “It’s just how you deal with it. And he’s starting to deal with it better.”
That was the case throughout her run, which included five three-setters and four wins, including a trio of top-10 seeds (No. 1 Sabalenka, No. 2 Iga Suatek, No. 6 Elena Rybakina and No. 10 Danielle Collins). Major champions (Sabalenka, Suatek, Rybakina). No woman has beaten the top two players in the WTA rankings since 2009.
Swiatek used the word “courageous” to describe the way Key played while saving a match point before coming to their final-set tiebreaker.
“To do that,” Keys said at his press conference, “I think, really, I thought to myself after the match that I could win on Saturday.”
He was very good early and down against Sabalenka.
From 5-all, 30-all, Key claimed six of the last eight points. He hammered first-strike forehand winners on consecutive points to hold serve, then earned the only break of the third set, capping it — fittingly — with another forehand winner.
“If he can play like that consistently, I mean, you can’t,” Sabalenka said.
How brave.
He went for it.
“My first semi-final here seems like forever ago. I mean, I honestly felt like I was a different person then. But I think that kind of happens when a lot of things have happened in the last decade,” Keys told the AP. “It kind of gelled to get to the point where I was finally able to go out and play some really good tennis and walk away with a Grand Slam. I did.”
