Ashleigh Barty ends 44-year wait for home Australian Open winner with victory over Danielle Collins
The TelegraphThe world No 1 for more than two years, Barty had come into this event as the top seed and bookies’ favourite, but there was always the chance that the enormous pressure of expectation – which had overcome her here in the last couple of seasons – would trip her up again. To be a very small part of an amazing history in tennis as an Australian is really, really neat.” At 25 years old, Barty now has three major titles – each of them on a different surface. “One of the biggest challenges that Jim set out for me when I was young was to be a complete player and be really consistent across all surfaces,” said Barty, in reference to her childhood coach Jim Joyce. I never probably thought it would ever happen to me.” The most unexpected facet of Barty’s game is her phenomenal serve, which is far more lethal than it has any right to be given her relatively small stature.. Against Collins, Barty’s pinpoint delivery allowed her to survive an otherwise scratchy first set, thanks to the remarkable 62 per cent of her serves which went unreturned.