Hsieh likes to do it her way

Melbourne – In an era of regimented game plans, strict training regimes, nutritionists and pre-match routines, one player is refreshingly going her own way – Hsieh Su-wei (above).

“She’s a free spirit,” said longtime coach Paul McNamee after Taiwan’s Hsieh became the oldest woman in the Open era to debut in the quarterfinals of a Slam.

“That’s the same with her tennis. She kind of acts on a whim sometimes, doesn’t like to plan too far ahead.”

“To think she’s 35 years of age, in her first Grand Slam quarterfinal,” McNamee said.

“I always believed she had a Grand Slam quarter at least in her. She’s achieved that now. She ticked that box.”

McNamee, who has coached Hsieh since 2011, said he never knows what will happen next.

“She was playing a match in Eastbourne one day,” he recalled.

“She missed two balls in a row by three metres. I noticed she was playing with broken strings,” said McNamee.

“She hadn’t broken a string for three years. She didn’t know what it was like.

“Players change racquets on the change of balls, right? She’ll go years with the same racquet.”

Eccentric or not, Hsieh’s natural talent was clear to see when she made her professional debut at the age of 16 in 2001.

Double-handed on both forehand and backhand sides, Hsieh went unbeaten in her first 33 matches on the ITF circuit and won five consecutive titles as a qualifier.

it wasn’t until she linked up with McNamee in 2011 that she began to handle life on tour – and her career flourished.

“Before I worked with him, I had a lot of time alone,” said Hsieh about Australian McNamee, a former ATP Tour player.

“That was why it was not easy to improve. Sometimes, I had no one to warm up with.”

Hsieh broke through at the highest level when she won the Wimbledon doubles in 2014 with China’s Peng Shuai and the French Open the following year,

Then with Barbora Strycova she won a second Wimbledon in 2019 and ended 2020 ranked world No 1 in doubles. –