Camel26 said:
Seto--I don't know who Kim Clijsters is...but I'm flattered to be awarded anything!!! 😀 Thank you!!!
Kim Clijsters would probably win if the Women's Tennis Association tour players voted for Most Popular Player. She is the blonde Flemish-speaking one of the two Belgians who have been among the top players for five years or so, and, being the daughter of a soccer player and a gymnast, is the player who can do a split in the middle of hitting a shot and still recover to go on with the rally. Before all those Russians took over in 2004, there was a two-year stretch in which all the Grand Slam finals were Serena Williams defeating Venus or Justine Henin-Hardenne (the Walloon of the two Belgians) defeating Clijsters. Kim even became the first player to be ranked #1 without winning a major, though that was in the middle of a season, and since then Lindsay Davenport has been ranked #1 at the end of the year two years running without winning a major in either year. Clijsters was engaged to the Australian player Lleyton Hewitt, and was virtually adopted by Australia. Early in 2004, she injured her wrist and was out for about a year, but loyally followed the tour and did what she could to promote it, unlike the occasionally graceless Williams sisters, who have said that they don't follow what's happening on tour when they are injured. For those who like drama, we begin at the US Open in 2004. Hewitt, a former winner there whose ranking had dipped and then gone back up, reached the final, in which he was creamed by Roger Federer, with two of the three sets 6-0. One of his rare gracious moments appeared to occur then when he thanked his fiancee Clijsters in the stands, still injured but sitting through the whole tournament to support him. Four months later, Hewitt reached the final of the 2005 Australian Open in a Major Event for Australia. Olivia Newton-John even sang before the match. (One cannot imagine, even if Tim Henman had ever reached the final, Elton John or anyone else singing at Wimbledon, though the women's final in the US Open has become a Prime Time Sporting Event with music and the usual 3/4-hour shtick before the match actually begins.) However, all the patriotism went for nought as Hewitt lost a close and weird match to the mercurial Russian, Marat Safin. He was again all full of thanks for his fiancee - only not Clijsters by this time, but a young Australian soap opera starlet, and pregnant as well, perhaps not quite four months pregnant, but the math didn't leave a lot of wiggle room. That is the least fond of Australia and Australians as I have ever been in my life. Hewitt has always been a bit boorish, but even though the new fiancee was a popular Australian celebrity, to make so much of the two of them was a very nasty slap to poor Kim, who was still injured at the time and doubtful of ever returning at all. But we did get a happy ending when Clijsters returned to the tour, won more tournaments last year than anyone else and finally at the US Open held it together in big matches against Venus Williams and Maria Sharapova, in situations when she'd usually lost her way in the past. She won an easy final over the 30-year-old Mary Pierce, and the first words out of Mary's mouth afterwards were how happy she was for Kim to finally win her first major. Lindsay Davenport, whom Clijsters battled for the #1 ranking for the year throughout the autumn, made a similar comment during her next tournament. This year's Australian Open is in the third round of seven now. Clijsters came in with a bad hip injury and wasn't sure she could even go on court for her first match, but she has won twice and her draw looks fairly easy to the semifinal round. Hewitt, the #3 seed, lost in the second round.
There's probably a moral for CD somewhere in there as well.
