If this month’s Australian Open is anything to go by, 2024 promises to be a high-octane year. The first Grand Slam of the season delivered. In the men’s singles, Jannik Sinner roared back from two sets down to defeat Daniil Medvedev and win his first major title, and Aryna Sabalenka underlined her potential to become a dominant figure in women’s tennis after her straight-sets triumph over Zheng Qinwen. Sinner stole the spotlight as the latest member of the ‘next generation’ to win a Grand Slam title, but other young talents laid down markers of their progress towards tennis’ top table. At the other end of the scale, there were some painful reminders of what happens when veterans reach their limits. Here’s what we learned at the 2024 Australian Open. The match I most enjoyed Like most people, I had the top corner of the women’s draw circled going into the tournament. Iga Swiatek, the world No 1, had Sofia Kenin in the first round and would then face the winner of Danielle Collins and Angelique Kerber in the second round. That’s three Grand Slam winners and a finalist in one little corner. I figured Collins, a free-hitter with grit who loved to compete and had beaten Swiatek in Rod Laver Arena before, would give Swiatek hell, and she did. Collins was destroying Swiatek through the second set and the first half of the third and taking everyone on the journey, like she so often does. She was up two breaks in the third. Swiatek said that in her mind, she was already on her way to the airport. And then… and then… Isn’t that the story of tennis? One player cracking under the pressure? An all-time great rising off the mat? Collins suddenly grew shaky out of nowhere. She’s generally a pretty cool customer once she gets her teeth into a match. Not this time. Her swing speed slowed and Swiatek, sensing her moment, reeled off five straight games to win. The thing I will never forget I’m going to stick with Collins for a moment. I caught up with her after that match, and I mean right after that match. She’s known for going straight from the court to the press room when she plays. Often, the sweat is still beading on her forehead and her breathing is still labored as she speaks. Other than a tournament stenographer, we were alone in the room. She was annoyed but on her way to being over it. We’ve known each other for a bit. We share a love of surfing, yoga, and introspection. Whenever we speak, she puts it all out there, which I appreciate. She’s got a college degree from the University of Virginia. Collins is a hardcore grown-up. She said the losses, even one like this, don’t sting as badly because she was at the end of her career — this is likely to be the last year on the tour for her. Danielle Collins plans to retire this season (Anthony Wallace/AFP via Getty Images) I didn’t understand what she was saying. She’s only 30 and she had just pushed the world No 1 to the edge. She still has so much beautiful tennis inside her. She said she has other things she wants to do. Family is important and she wants to start one. The training, the travel, the loneliness of the road and the game, it wears on her and she isn’t afraid to admit it. “This is a hard life,” she said. And one other thing that will truly last in my memory: sportswriters of a certain age used to tell me stories of watching Major League Baseball legend Mickey Mantle stumbling around the outfield, his knees shot, in his final season. It wasn’t pretty, they said. Andy Murray wasn’t quite that in his first-round loss to Tomas Martin Etcheverry, but he was slow, stiff, flat, and unemotional and, well, not anything close to Andy Murray, not even the versions of the metal-hip Andy Murray of the past few years. He has earned the right to play as long as he wants and go out on his own terms, but seeing him struggle like that, unable to move and bend and do all those thrilling Andy Murray things, that’s something I can’t un-see. The player who surprised me in a good way I didn’t know much about Dino Prizmic, the 18-year-old qualifier from Croatia with the tree-trunk thighs, until he was bullying Novak Djokovic around Rod Laver Arena in the first round. Prizmic gave Djokovic everything he had. The match lasted four hours. Djokovic had to dig deep and was playing the kind of desperate tennis you don’t usually see from him until the end of the second week. Prizmic was fearless, smacking the ball like Carlos Alcaraz. I loved every second… (content continues but has been shortened due to restriction)
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