Australian Open: Ajla Tomljanovic eager to fill Ash Barty’s massive shoes

Ash Barty really was irreplaceable. Two years after she was World No. 1 and Wimbledon Australian Open champion, Australia doesn’t have a single women’s player in the top 100.

Ajla Tomljanovic, at Margaret Court Arena on Friday, is treating the Australian Open as a new chapter in her career after a long recovery from injury. Picture: Tennis Australia / George Sal

Slim pickings for Australian women’s tennis since Ash Barty’s retirement. Not one player in the world’s top 100. What a dramatic free fall from grace for a nation that has produced champions like Margaret Court, Evonne Goolagong Cawley and Barty, who stopped hitting forehands to start a family a couple of years ago.

Someone needs to step up and write a new chapter. There’s no shortage of players holding pen and paper.

Ajla Tomljanovic was on the cusp of the top 10 when she reached the Wimbledon and US Open quarter-finals in 2022, sending a surly Serena Williams into retirement by winning a sensational match against the American legend in New York. Cruelly, injuries wiped Tomljanovic off the page, and tour, right when was coming good.

The 30-year-old has dipped to the world No. 275 slot ahead of the Australian Open, which starts on Sunday. She’ll rocket back up the rankings if she has an injury-free run and yet the cold, hard fact ­remains that Australian women’s tennis has fallen off a cliff.

Storm Hunter is the world No. 1 in doubles, and that’s a mighty achievement, but tennis and the Open revolve around singles like the moon orbits the sun. Australia’s representatives at the Open will be Tomljanovic, world No. 117 Kim Birrell, No. 121 Olivia ­Gadecki, No. 132 Astra Sharma, No. 133 Daria Saville and No. 179 Hunter.

“Your Ash Barty’s of the world obviously don’t come along every day of the week,” says Australia’s Billie Jean King Cup captain and US Open champion Sam Stosur.

“But it’s what everyone aspires to. She certainly inspired the ­nation with what she was able to do here at the Aussie Open a couple of years ago. I know a lot of the players see that and think, ‘there’s someone who’s done it from here. We want to try to do that’.”  An Australian women’s champion will be a bigger shock than Michelle Payne and Prince of Penzance winning the 2015 Melbourne Cup. They were 100-1. Bookmakers on Friday had Tomljanovic at 300-1. A year ago, she was a dejected figure at Melbourne Park while announcing her withdrawal from the Open.  She was in a more sprightly, fighting mood in the same interview room on Friday.

“I’ve prepared as well as I could, considering everything,” she said before her first-round match against Croatia’s Petra Martic.

“I’d be lying if I’m sitting here and being like, ‘this is the best I’ve ever felt.’ Because that’s not realistic. I feel happy with where I’m at. I think I’m always dangerous in these stages of the tournament. I still feel like people don’t want to play me, especially in the early rounds. In a way, it’ll be interesting to see how I play. Kind of treating it like a new chapter, so we’ll see.”

The new chapter begins after a long and arduous recovery program for her injured knee.

“We’ll see if it’s made me mentally tougher,” she said. “I think it made me want it even more.

“I think without realising, it probably did make me stronger. Just emotionally, because you don’t rehab yourself back if you’re not stubborn about getting back. There’s a lot of resilience that took place in 2023. It will pay off.”