After break, Andreescu ‘ready to go’
“I’m so goddamn grateful to be on the court.”
If one word can encapsulate the dizzying zigzag of Bianca Andreescu’s career — the thrills and the ills — then goddamn just about nails it.
From the historical starburst of winning Canada’s first major tennis title, U.S. Open laurels, to then all but vanishing from the scene — a plague of injuries preceding the pandemic of COVID-19 — fifteen months have passed since Andreescu last swung a racket in fury: at the WTA Finals in Shenzhen, Oct. 30, 2019, retiring from her match with Karolina Pliskova because of a left knee ailment.
The dreaded meniscus tear. Since then, Andreescu has been a fleeting presence on social media, usually announcing, so sorry, she wouldn’t be here or there, teasing up a tournament then withdrawing, as occurred this past week at the Grampians Trophy in Melbourne.
“It was mainly because I had two weeks of not training and I didn’t want to take the risk of having just a couple of days’ preparation,” Andreescu explained on Friday.
A fortnight in mandatory lockdown, restricted to her hotel room, along with 72 other players who’d arrived in Australia on three charter flights on which some deplaning passengers had tested positive for the coronavirus, including her coach, Sylvain Bruneau.
This is life as we know it now, constant disruptions and the thwarting of bestlaid plans constructed around preven
tion protocols.
Andreescu’s withdrawal had the social media trolls chirping. “Yeah, I know. I saw a tag … saying, ‘Oh, Bianca’s first tournament back, blah-blah-blah. I’m like, oh God, here we go again. I made sure to post on social media that I’m good, I’m ready to go.”
She is good and ready to go at the Australian Open, which launches Monday, seeded eighth. Definitely, absolutely, indubitably. Rarin’ to go.
The upside of such a long furlough is that 20-year-old Andreescu is, she assures, in top-notch shape: nothing nagging, at a physically fit apogee for what might be termed a comeback, though that suggests she’d been on a slide beforehand. There was no slump; just a body that had rebelled — a frequent pattern admittedly — from the punishing grind of elite tennis. In fact, her penultimate tournament had featured one of the most memorable matches of 2019 — a tilt between Grand Slam champions at the China Open, Naomi Osaka rollicking back from a set and a break down.
“I love playing against her,” says Andreescu. “It’s always a battle.”
She’s wised up to taking the measure of her body because that will determine how far she can go in this sport. Hence taking a last-minute pass on Grampians.
“I’ve made some mistakes in the past. I learned from it. That was kind of the main objective, because I told myself that I’d have at least before a big tournament a good week where I can play sets.” Two weeks stuck in quarantine, playing shadow tennis, sent that agenda off the rails. “Having those two weeks off, that doesn’t help at all. Yeah, I can do gym fitness, shadow tennis, but that’s not the same as being on the court. I didn’t want to make the same mistake.”
No one is certain how seamlessly Andreescu can return to champion form, or merely competition form. Bruneau is as anxious to see how the Open will unspool as anybody else.
“This is new territory for us,” Bruneau said on a Zoom call with reporters. “She’s been in situations before, where she was away from the courts for a few months and she was able to manage those situations really well and perform when she was back into competing. Obviously this has not unfolded the way we wanted because we were counting on having two weeks of more preparation here and play lead-up tournaments, which we were not able to do.
“I feel her level is getting back slowly where it needs to be (but) we’re going to need to wait and see exactly how she’s going to react.”
While it’s tempting to remember only the good times, injury setbacks bedevilled that wondrous 2019 season as well, a year that began with Andreescu ranked 152 and ended with her rocketing to world No. 5 — a breakthrough spectrum that incorporated tour titles at Indian Wells, the Rogers Cup in Toronto and a huge exclamation mark, knocking off Serena
Williams for the hardware at Flushing Meadows on the afternoon of Sept. 7. She was 19 years old.
What she recalls most about that marquee confrontation was the noise of a crowd in adoration of Williams. “At 5-5, I was like: ‘Yo, I’m gonna do my best to win all these points so the crowd would shut up,” Andreescu told the Guardian recently. “Because they were so loud.”
The new Bianca, with a dyed blond layer of tresses underneath a shortened bob, is a fitness tuning fork, quivering with the toned muscles she expects will help her withstand the fatigue of long matches. And, her team hopes, avert the injuries that often result. No doubt, however, it’s going to hurt after a protracted absence from competition, which can’t really be replicated in training sessions.
“I know I’m going to be sore as hell after my first match, that’s for sure. I’m not looking forward to it.”
Except she is, of course. Has thought of little else during these monotonous days and since getting back on an actual court five months ago, first training in Barcelona, then Monaco — Andreescu owns a home away from Mississauga there — and then shifting to Dubai in advance of the tour assembling in Melbourne.
Most of the lockout was spent in Toronto, however, where the gyms and tennis courts were shuttered. So the fancyschmancy gym equipment was delivered to her doorstep. Otherwise the hours were filled playing Call of Duty on her Xbox — which she’d tossed out seven years ago because the addiction was consuming too much of her time — writing in her journal, reading, meditating and visualizing.
“Stared at a wall for a couple of minutes a day too,” she smiles. And, on occasion, just sat on her bed and cried with the frustration of it all.
From the outside looking in, surely Andreescu must have raged at the fates, perhaps wondered if the whole world was conspiring against her?
“I try not to have that mindset. Obviously I have bad days where I think to myself, ask myself, why me, why is this happening, blah-blah-blah. I really do believe that everything happens for a reason, as cliché as that might sound.
“I try to focus on the things I can control. I can’t stress that enough. I always say it, but that really helps me stay less stressed than if I don’t follow that rule.”
She did strive to relocate that frame of mind from 2019 by watching video of her matches from that season. She inhaled herself. “I really got into the mood, into the mindset. I felt the same things like I did in 2019, which I think really helps me just get in character.
“It really inspired me too, just watching myself play again. I don’t normally like to do that.”
Her mental fortitude has never been in doubt and she’s well aware of pressure to recapture the magic of 2019. While her goals haven’t changed, still aiming to be world No. 1, Andreescu is also realistic about the here and now. Even with the wind in her sails, a Grand Slam blows hard against a player’s desire. Yet she pictures it, she always pictures it.
“I really don’t know how it’s going to be. I really trust in my capabilities. Also the time off, I was able to reflect a lot on myself, on the world, how things have changed so dramatically all at once.”
Yet here she is, where she feels the most comfortable, the most joyful.
On the tennis court, with a racket and a ball. Being Bianca.