Barty’s No.1 play is safety

DEFENDING points to keep her No.1 ranking is the last thing Ash Barty is thinking about as she tries to plot her way through this year.

Fresh off her quarter-final defeat at the Australian Open, Barty is in South Australia to defend her Adelaide International title knowing she’s become the hunted having held on to the top ranking despite not playing for most of 2020.

The 24-year-old Queenslander is still more than 1000 rankings points clear of twotime Australian Open champion Naomi Osaka, who has won four of the past nine Grand Slams played, thanks to the WTA’s changes to its system last year.

But Barty will continue to prioritise the health and safety of her and her team as they look to play more this year.

“As for defending points, I think it’s a very negative way of looking at it,” Barty said in Adelaide on Monday.

“We plan as best that we can but obviously in the current situation nothing is certain, it’s difficult.

“We just go with the advice that we have been given. We trust that the situation we’re going into is the right situation, it’s safe and all of the right protocols have been put in place.

“So for the time being, we focus on this week ... and we move onto the schedule a little bit later on. I would love to be back on tour fulltime and all those decisions will come as close as we can to the event but ... it’s hard for me to comment right now.”

Barty said events like Wimbledon and the French Open, where she won her lone Grand Slam title in 2019, were a “long way off” and she wouldn’t get caught thinking that far ahead.

Barty said she had moved on from her loss in Melbourne, which was “tough”, but not painful.

“All losses are tough. None are painful,” she said. “There are only positives to gain from it ... and we come into another opportunity here this week.”