Stanislas Wawrinka’s has been a well-documented struggle with self-confidence. For someone who has fought as long and as hard as him, it is tough to throw out the demon forever. While the end of 2013 was the first big step towards banishing it, in 2014 he would like to finally believe he is up there.
On Sunday, the quest for the same started perfectly. A 7-5, 6-2 win over seventh seed Edouard Roger-Vasselin gave him his second Aircel Chennai Open title and his fifth overall.
“It’s the best tennis I have played in my six visits to the city,” Wawrinka said. “I was expecting this tough match. Maybe I could have started it better. But I am really happy.”
One of Wawrinka’s problems in 2013 was that he found it tough to close out matches. After a nervy first set, in which the Frenchman hurled everything he had at Wawrinka, it was important for the old ghosts not to return.
“I had not lost a set this week,” Wawrinka said. “So I was confident. After the first set, it was crucial to make the right decisions and I did.”
Roger-Vasselin presented his opponent with some new problems to solve, something the Swiss had not got against his three previous opponents. He served and volleyed, chipped and charged to cut the rallies short.
“That’s the way I won against him in Basel last year,” said Roger-Vasselin. “It was the best way. But he played much better today, passed me better and he was simply too good.”
In the first set, there were to be no breaks till the 11th game. Though Wawrinka came close in the fourth, he fluffed four break points. A few forehands and backhands went awry. But when he connected, Roger-Vasselin’s double-handed backhand — which had worked so well against Marcel Granollers — found the depth, the angle and the power of Wawrinka’s shots too much to handle. The World No. 52 instead had to rely on the single handed slice to cover one more yard of court space.
Serving at 6-5, and on set point, Wawrinka let out a huge cry after Roger-Vasselin shanked his return. That seemed to release all pressure and the next set was smooth sailing.
Roger-Vasselin continued his net-rushing game even after Wawrinka broke him early in the second. With Wawrinka relentlessly chasing every drop shot, and in the process scooping some balls for winners of his own, Roger-Vasselin had to go finer.
Though he did find some success, he could not sustain it for long.
The top seed broke again in the fifth game to go 4-1 up and there was to be no looking back.
“It has been a great week for me,” said Roger Vasselin. “But it’s also very disappointing to lose. It’s a mixed feeling and I don’t know where my mind is right now.”
The 28-year-old Swiss’s ascent in 2013 came at a time when the thorough domination by the ‘Big Four’ was becoming slightly tiresome, Nadal and Djokovic’s see-saw rivalry notwithstanding. His was the new narrative that everybody lapped up instantly.
While this year, there is expected to be no let-off from the top four — as seen in Doha, where Rafael Nadal won, and Brisbane, where Roger Federer was the finalist — there is a yearning for Wawrinka to go one step further and gatecrash the top four.
“It’s still too far and I don’t ask myself that question yet,” the World No. 8 said, but the journey seems to have well begun.
Later on, in the doubles final, fourth seeds Johan Brunstrom of Sweden and Frederik Nielsen of Denmark defeated the unseeded Croatian pair of Mate Pavic and Marin Draganja 6-2, 4-6, 10-7.
The Scandinavian pair broke twice, in the sixth and the eight games, to take the first set 6-2 only for the Croats to level it at one set apiece by taking the second 6-4. In the match tie-break, Brunstrom and Nielsen clinched the title on their first championship point, winning it 10-7. This is Nielsen’s second career title — first since the Wimbledon 2012 crown that he won with Jonathan Marray — and Brunstrom’s fourth.
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