Ash Barty clinches second clay title of career on her return to Europe

In Ash Barty’s first tournament in Europe since her French Open win, the Australian claimed her 11th title.

Ash Barty has tightened her grip on the world’s top ranking by claiming her third title for the year with a victory in Stuttgart over Aryna Sabalenka. (Photo by Alex Grimm/Getty Images)

In her first event in Europe since her French Open success in 2019, Ash Barty has shown great resilience against elite rivals to claim a clay court championship in Germany.

A day after celebrating her 25th birthday, Barty made the weekend one to remember when overcoming powerful Belarusian Aryna Sabalenka 3-6 6-0 6-3 in 1hr 48min to claim the 11th title of her career.

After dropping a tight first set against a rival who thumped Simona Halep in the semi-finals, the Australian was able to absorb Sabalenka’s strength in a balanced performance.

It is the Australian’s second clay court title following her famous breakthrough at Roland Garros and her third triumph of the year following after successes in the Yarra Valley Classic and the Miami Open.

Barty, who has won half of the six tournaments she has played this year, has tightened her grip on the world’s top ranking.

She has also moved to the top of the year end points race in what has been a superb return to the court after sitting out much of last year due to the pandemic.

Barty has now won her last ten outings against top 10 ranked rivals, including her last three matches of the tournament in Stuttgart.
In each of those matches against former world No 1 Karolina Pliskova, Elina Svitolina and then Sabalenka, Barty was forced to overcome at least a deficit of a set, but showed tremendous poise when under pressure.

The victor of the tournament wins a Porsche, but the Australian has a conflict given her sponsorship from Jaguar.

Barty pockets the champion’s purse of just over $86,000 and was looking to cap the weekend when partnering Jennifer Brady in the doubles final.

Given the history between Barty and Sabalenka, who had split their six prior outings, a tight final was expected, and the opening set did not disappoint.

An errant forehand drop shot by Barty when facing a break point while trailing 3-4 was all that split the two finalists in the opening set.

If the first set was tight, the second was a cakewalk for Barty, who was at the top of her game as the precision of her rival unravelled completely.

Ultimately, it took Barty just 20 minutes to level the final as she clinched the second set without the loss of a game, with her variety completely snapping the rhythm of Sabalenka.

The drastic change in momentum prompted the Australian’s rival to leave the court after calling for a medical time-out.

The issue was not immediately apparent, for the Belarusian did not appear to lack any power or be hindered in her movement, despite the clear dip in her level.

But when she returned to the court, Sabalenka had strapping applied to her right thigh.

In the infancy of her comeback at the Australian Open in February, Barty lost her concentration when Karolina Muchova called a medical time-out in their quarterfinal. She vowed to learn from the lesson.

With Sabalenka off the court, Barty used the time to stretch and play shadow tennis _ a practice similar to shadow boxing.

She started the third set by folding a forehand winner and was able to hold serve with ease to continue her momentum.

Barty was able to claim an eighth game in succession when her rival pulled a forehand wide on break point.

With her frustration apparent, Sabalenka was able to break the run of games against her in the following service game, effectively by thumping the ball as hard as she could.

The release of her stress facilitated a return to her first set form.

Sabalenka thumped a couple of winners and held opportunities to retrieve the service break in the third set, managing to do so when Barty netted a forehand.

From what threatened to be a third set wipe-out when Barty led 3-0, the final was effectively back on level terms.

But Sabalenka played another wild service game, capped by a double fault, to allow the Queenslander to move to a 4-2 lead.

To the credit of the fifth seed, she continued to thunder ground strokes, but Barty was able to rise to the occasion on three separate break points as she continued to serve superbly.