Tennis: Barty runs rings around Rybakina to win Adelaide International

Ash Barty has skipped to an emphatic victory at the Adelaide International. She had too much flair and imagination for another Russian ball machine of a foe.

Ash Barty won the Adelaide International on the back of her all-court game Picture: Getty Images

Ash Barty strolls out against 185cm ball machine Elena Rybakina. The Russian has similarities to Maria Sharapova. She can give the ball a decent clout but like Sharapova, there’s a glaring weakness to be exploited. She doesn’t exactly run like the wind. Her movement is more of a slow, gentle breeze.

It’s the final of the Adelaide International. Rybakina serving at 0-1, 40-0. Barty hits a drop shot. Rybakina takes most of the afternoon to set after it. Her long legs take a while to hit anything resembling full stride. There’s no squeaking shoes you hear when the speedsters are scampering around. It’s a rather heavy-footed, ungainly attempt that brings to mind.

Sharapova’s self-effacing description of her own movement as “like a giraffe on ice.” Barty wins the point and sticks it in her memory bank. She gallops away to a 6-3, 6-2 win for the 14th WTA title of her career.

She accepts a wonderfully Indigenous-themed trophy and suggests the more Australians rally behind her, the better she goes. “You guys, the fans, have made this week exceptional for me,” she tells the roaring patrons at Memorial Drive. “You’ve brought that spark back to my tennis and I thank you so much for that. I really do appreciate it.”

No doubt the game plan she’s cooked up with coach Craig Tyzzer includes the intention to drag Rybakina out of ball-machine mode whenever the moment is right. Side-to-side. Up-and-down. All around. The 22-year-old world No.14 has a powerful game that has already taken her far. Ball machines like her can go a heck of a long way in women’s tennis – look at Sharapova – because they spend most of their careers in rallies against other ball machines. The only problem with being a ball machine is that you can’t run too well, and Barty is one of the few players who has the variation in game style to break down the machines.

The hard-hitting Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan had only one plan against Ash Barty Picture: Getty Images

The best ball machines always take some beating. They’re robotic and unimaginative but they’re nothing if not consistent. The first set is tight but while Barty has Plans A, B, C, D and perhaps W, X, Y and Z to fall back on, Rybakina simply has A. Give the ball a clout while wearing a dress fit for a safari park. When the scoreboard starts getting away from her, she starts short-circuiting, making wild unforced errors, getting cranky at her coach, frustrated because a ball machine doesn’t really know how to be anything other than a ball machine.

The 166cm-tall Barty cannot have wished for a more promising start to her Australian Open quest. If she keeps this up she’ll go undefeated for the month. She looks fitter. She’s hitting her serves and select groundstrokes faster. She looks authoritative, as if she’s grown into her position of world No.1. The Adelaide international has been a mini-major. This week’s Sydney Tennis Classic is another. Maybe she’s better off having a laugh in Sydney. Winning streaks and purple patches have a habit of coming to an end right when you don’t want them to.

Her reaction to her Adelaide triumph is understated. As if this is just the beginning. Eyes are clearly on a bigger prize at Melbourne Park. Only a positive test to Covid may catch her out. Tyzzer has parked himself in the same courtside seat at Memorial Drive and witnessed the same four results. Win, win, win, win.

Barty nods at Tyzzer and says, “To my team. Thank you, guys, for sticking with me through the thick and the thin, and making this so enjoyable. For making my career so much fun. I love you guys and I love sharing this with you. Thank you, guys, and we’ll catch everyone in Melbourne.”

Which has suggested she may give Sydney a miss. She’s hardly starved of match practice and you won’t blame her if she gives the Harbour City a miss. As it stands, she’s still in a draw that includes world No. 2 Garbine Muguruza and US Open champion Emma Raducanu. Barty gets a first-round bye. She may face Australian Priscilla Hon in her first match; Rybakina or Raducanu is her likely quarter-final opponent. Winning another mini-major seems an agreeable way to get ready for the real one.