Konta sounds a confident note in illness fight
Halep insists there is no danger that she will lose any motivation now that she has achieved her biggest goals. “I could even say that I’m now more motivated,” she said. “Because I’ve won one Grand Slam title I feel like I have a good chance to win more. I’m going to work hard, I’ll continue to do the same things, to be professional, and I’ll look forward to more of these good moments.”
Last year’s first-round defeat here was not the biggest surprise given that Sharapova had won all six of her previous meetings with Halep, but the Russian was ranked No 146 in the world after making a stop-start comeback following her 15-month suspension for a drugs offence.
“I didn’t play badly, but I think she had extra motivation to do well here,” Halep said. “It was good timing for her. She didn’t have any pressure. She was facing the world No2. Maybe she had greater energy than me to win that match.”
Although Halep will be expected to win her first-round match against Kaia Kanepi, she is in a tricky part of the draw, seeded to meet Serena or Venus Williams in the fourth round and Karolina Pliskova or Garbine Muguruza in the quarter-finals.
“It’s a tough draw, but I don’t have drama in my mind,” Halep said. “I just look forward to starting this one. I’m just here to give everything I have. If I do that, I’m OK.”
Halep feels comfortable going into the tournament as top seed. “After the French Open, I haven’t felt the pressure any more because I like to be in this position,” she said. “It’s the best thing to be there. I can say I have a big chance for this tournament, but it’s tough to say that I’m the favourite, even if I’m No1.
“You can see now the level [of all players] is very tough. Everyone is playing at maybe the highest level. Every match, every round is difficult. I’m just looking forward to playing my first match. If I win it, I will focus on the next one just like that.”
Halep has looked in good shape in the two tournaments she has played on hard courts this summer, having won the ti- tle in Montreal and reached the final in Cincinnati. She is certainly in a much better frame of mind than she was at Wimbledon, where she admitted after her third-round defeat to Su-Wei Hsieh that she felt mentally exhausted.
A three-week break after Wimbledon, including a beach holiday in the Bahamas, helped to revive the world No1.
“I had time to refresh my mind and my emotions,” she said. “I was really motivated when I came back. I felt like I had a good game and was playing well, so I just had to keep my confidence high. Of course I had some tough matches, especially the first one in Montreal, but after I won that I felt better inside.”
PAUL NEW MAN IN NEW YORK
JOHANNA Konta is confident of fully recovering from illness in time for her first-round clash with Caroline Garcia at the US Open on Tuesday.
The British number one was forced to withdraw ahead of a scheduled second-round match at the Connecticut Open last week after coming down with a flu-type virus.
Konta is still not back to full health but has been able to leave her sick bed and get out on court at Flushing Meadows.
She said: “As you can probably hear I’m bunged up but loads better, I started hitting yesterday so it’s good.
“I got sick on the day I woke up for the first round in New Haven, and I got through that day but then it just progressively got worse. I had a terrible night that night and the next day I could hardly move so I was like, ‘I don’t think I could physically go out and play a match’.
“So that’s why I took the decision to not play because I couldn’t physically play and since then I’ve been looking to feel better.
“There’s some sort of virus, I had really bad sinuses and right ear. I gave it to my coach so Michael (Joyce) and I were down but we are both getting back up.”
Konta comes into the tournament unseeded after her slide to 46 in the rankings and has paid the price by drawing sixth seed Garcia.
The good news for the British number one is she has a 3-2 winning record against her French opponent, most recently coming through a three-set struggle at Wimbledon last summer, while her shaky form has picked up on the North American hard courts.