By Charles Bricker
That was yet another tough loss on Wednesday afternoon for Bethanie Mattek-Sands and there was no sense in rationalizing it. It was a chance to build a winning streak, an opportunity to take down the No. 30 ranked player and let the rest of the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour know she is fully back from hip surgery.
But she’s not going to torture herself over this 7-6 (4), 4-6, 6-2 loss to Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova because she knows she’s pushing most of the right buttons.
Still, this isn’t the same Bethanie Mattek who finished 2008 at No. 39 in the world. For one thing, she’s now married to insurance broker Justin Sands. For another, she’s had essentially the same hip operation that has doomed too many tennis careers.
Any return to form is going to take time, though she sounds patient. “When I had that run in 2008, it told me I can beat some of the best players out there. Now, it’s a matter of putting it all together, stringing matches together. That’s what I’m trying to attain,” she explained.
Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., this week — opening clay court event of the season — looked like a good spot for Mattek-Sands. She won three qualifying matches to make the main draw and won a round before losing to the Russian.
“I have a lot of shots, a lot of weapons. The biggest thing for me is when to use what shots. I’m going to get back to playing more aggressively. I’m even playing a few serve-and-volley points,” she said.
“Physically, I’m there, as good if not better than before surgery. Mentally, it means winning matches. That’s the thing you need — the mental confidence that comes when you come back and close things out.”
She remains in doubles at Ponte Vedra, then makes the short drive north to Charleston, S.C., where next week she has a wild card into the main draw.
She’ll pick up a few points this week to improve on her current No. 132 ranking, but as low as she’s slipped, the old Mattek enthusiasm is still there, and it was great to once again listen to her easy laugh.
She has long been one of the great characters in women’s tennis, though there was nothing funny about contemplating hip surgery a little over a year ago.
“I was freaking out. Tatiana Golovin, Jamea Jackson, Guga Kuerten, Lleyton Hewitt . . . no one has really come all the way back after hip surgery,” said Mattek-Sands. “Up until the week before the surgery was scheduled I was debating whether to have it. But I knew I couldn’t keep playing tennis at 50 percent of my movement. I was a nervous wreck. Finally, I said, ‘Listen, I need to go back and play tennis.’ ”
There was a torn labrum and three bone spurs and her doctor, a former professional squash player, understood the difficulty of coming back from this operation, so they decided on the least invasive procedure possible. So far, at least medically, things seem good.
Mattek-Sands is back on court, now 3-4 for the season, and dealing with one of the realities of the ranking system — while it’s easy to quickly move up the rankings with some big wins, it’s just as easy to move down.
In consecutive weeks in ’08, she upset No. 10 Marion Bartoli, the former Wimbledon runner-up, to reach the round of 16 at the All England Club, then followed with a semifinal finish at Los Angeles, where she defeated No. 22 Nicole Vaidisova before losing 7-5 in the third to No. 21 Flavia Pennetta. Her ranking reached 45 and was headed to a career best 38.
A year later, following surgery, she went out in the opening round at Wimbledon and all the points she was defending from ’08 conspired to send her reeling from No. 57 to No. 125.
Mattek-Sands gained a lot of notoriety early in her career for some pretty grotesque outfits on court. Those fashion statement days are over, but she has lost none of her garrulous personality or verbal flair.
She and Sands had planned to marry in Scotland on the middle Sunday at Wimbledon in 2008 until Bethanie stunned Bartoli in the third round. Sunday would now be devoted to getting ready to play Venus Williams. Sorry, Justin.
They waited, instead, until November and were married on the beach at Naples, Fla.
They met through a doctor in Pennsylvania both were using. “The doctor told me he wanted me to go to Phoenix to train with Justin. I had no idea what he looked like. Just hoped he was cute. It was love at first sight. I opened the door and he definitely was not what I expected. You know, he’s an insurance man.
“His baseball cap was turned backward. Very good looking. Freckles, red hair. We both did double takes. Over the next three days, we talked about everything. But, you know, the funny thing is he’s never technically asked me to marry him.
“He came to Paris for the French Open in 2008, where I had qualified, and surprised me. He had bought a ring at Tiffany’s at the Heathrow Airport (London) during his layover and handed me the box, saying, ‘Listen, I’ve got something for you. If you don’t like it, I’ll give it to my little cousin.’ ”
It wasn’t quite an engagement ring, but Sands took care of that detail at Wimbledon a few weeks later. “Same thing. He told me I have something for you and it was the diamond ring. But he never actually asked me to marry him,” Mattek-Sands laughed.
They’re traveling together this year and that’s given Bethanie a lot more comfort in this comeback, but she still has to get the results on court.
She began the year at No. 154 and lost in the third round of qualifying at the Australian Open. Captain Mary Joe Fernandez then picked her to play Fed Cup singles for the U.S. against France and Bethanie defeated former top-10 Alize Cornet. That was a confidence boost.
She won a round at Memphis and a round at Indian Wells before going to Ponte Vedra, but the losses haven’t been disastrous — No. 16 Maria Sharapova at Memphis, No. 20 Shahar Peer at Indian Wells.
Charles Bricker can be reached at nflwriterr@aol.com
