MVN - Most Valuable Network

A Shadowy Sister Shines

There has probably been more stuff written about Marat Safin’s slumping ways than there is the totality of stories on his younger sister, Dinara Safina, but after Sunday’s victory in Berlin the story may now be all about little sis.

Dinara Safina has been hovering in the Top 20 for several years now, and even though she has a few good wins over bigger players here and there she has never been able to put together lengthy runs of consistently good play. If you had asked me for a thumbnail sketch of her as a player, I would have said something like, “Good serving game, great two-handed backhand especially up the line, decent enough forehand but wildly inconsistent mentally, as much a Wild Child emotionally on the court as her brother.” This past Sunday though, Dinara Safina experienced one of those transformative weeks in a player’s life when they Step It Up by winning her first Tier I title over long-time rival Elena Dementieva by the score of 3-6, 6-2, 6-2.

The serving game is still there, in fact it has improved hugely. The woman weighs each serve with care and some thought: you’d think she was NASA getting ready to launch a shuttle into outer space. Or at least Patrick Rafter, who placed some care into his deliveries too. We don’t get to see many women players do enough of this. Take Jelena Jankovic for instance, who can’t wait to race thru her motion just to get the point going. Safina has a habit of looking towards heaven first, then her toss arm moves into the frame of her vision and she hits the ball. Her big serving paid off hugely this past week in Berlin. Case in point: in the third set final against Elena Dementieva, Safina aimed a serve out wide to the forehand that fell halfway up the service line. It just missed though. Undaunted Safina came right back with the same serve to the same place, and nailed a service winner. Dementieva was so surprised she dumped the return well down into the net. Safina mixed the serves up well, the wide serve being her favorite but she is just as happy to beat you up the T.

Speaking of servers, Dementieva did not do too badly in that department either, and I never thought the day would come when we could say that of her. She held her own ground pretty well serving, and that makes her an especially dangerous opponent, because we know Elena has a formidable ground game. Still, Safina had enough answers to move into the front line of players who have a chance to do damage at Roland Garros.

Her week included wins over Justine Henin, the Number One ranked seed in Berlin, but clearly Henin is not playing now like Number One. Even with a first set win over Safina, Henin could not deny her and ended up losing the next two sets in tame fashion. A big win over a player like Henin normally signals that the upstart will lose in woeful fashion in the very next round, especially when the opponent looming is Serena Williams. She’s been on a tear this year, looks formidably fit, and has the look in her eye that says she wants Number One again.

But even Serena could not cope with the heavy, deep shots from both wings of Safina, and Safina’s serving game was deadlier than Serena’s. She became increasingly frustrated that Safina would not fold up her tent and steal off, as in times past. It was Serena who cracked under the pressure of the third set tiebreak, and Dinara was into the semifinals. There she faced and beat a younger version of herself in rising star Victoria Azarenka of Belarus, another big hitter with an impressive ground game and good serve but also a high degree of volatility when she plays.

The thing that most impressed was Safina’s composure. She had chances to show her stuff when she was ahead, but she was also behind a lot of the way too. And in those moments she stayed tough enough and bided her time until she got the shots she wanted, and then she took them.

Her backhand drop shot was lovely, well-disguised, and dipped so quickly just over the net that even a great retriever like Dementieva had her hands full with it. Often she got there, but Safina cagily followed the shot in and was there to punch away the Dementieva replies. “I played a lot of drop shots and I think they really helped to win today,” Safina said after the match.

There are a few things for Safina to work on. Movement is always going to be a weak spot for her. She’s a big girl and she doesn’t begin to move like her brother, one of the smoothest, quickest big men ever in the game. I don’t know how far she can improve on this. I’m sure she’s working on quickness drills up the wazoo already, and her anticipation seems pretty good. Ana Ivanovic is a big girl too, but she seems to have a lot more pizazz going for her when she moves about the court. Surely Safina could get up to that level at least. As she said:

I didn’t move that well at the beginning, even though I know I have to move really well for my game and use all the power I have; I thought ‘Come on, you’ve got to make it today,’ and I fought my way back in.

Another quibble I had during the match was that Safina needed to attack the second serve more. After all, this is Dementieva we’re talking here, she of the wounded little birdy second serves. The Tennis Channel commentators went on about how well Dementieva can manage to back up her rather halting serves with her ground game, but that only underscores for me that you have to make better returns off her serves. Try a “James Blake” return now and then - just step into the ball and flatten it out to a particular spot. But Safina played most of those returns in safe fashion, rolling them back deep up the middle.

Her groundies have pace but they are on the loopy side. A few more flat balls with pace mixed in would be nice, especially when you play someone like Dementieva, who wins a lot of rallies hitting exactly those kinds of shots. Safina could take a page here.

Overall though Safina’s whole aura now seems different to me on court. Before she reminded me of a large dumpling, and when she walks - on the outside of her feet - everything seems to roll. She favors a two-piece outfit usually, which exposes her midriff. There’s still a little roll of flesh visible, but now it’s less of a tire and more of a jelly roll. That counts as progress in my book. She has definitely lost some weight, her muscles show nicely sculpted definition, and in the surprisingly sunny week in Berlin, Dinara Safina radiated a golden aura to match the weather. You could feel she was getting more and more comfortable with the roll she was on, and it was easy to get behind her, she invited you along and it was great to see her doing all the right things.

Her English is still pretty rough, but intelligible, and in her post match interview she spoke humorously about getting advice from Big Brother Marat. “You’re doing everything wrong,” he basically told her recently. Well now you see, she retorted with humor, and basically, screw you, Brother. He won a third set 7-5 on the same day, so the Safin family must be feeling its oats on mother’s day. “I hope I won’t wake up tomorrow and realize this was just a dream,” Safina said. I hope so too, sweetheart. Pinch her, she probably won’t mind.

With a new-found poise and maturity, I look for Safina to have a good time at Roland Garros this year. How appropriate that her trophy had a golden falcon atop it. This chick has finally spread her wings and taken flight.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 12th, 2008 at 12:06 pm and is filed under Marat Safin, Ana Ivanovic, Jelena Jankovic, Justine Henin, Serena Williams, French Open, WTA Players, ATP Players, WTA Tournaments. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.