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Adelaide, Australia, 3 Jan (AFP): World number two Aryna Sabalenka said on Monday that she will only consider 2022 a successful year if she can break through and win a maiden Grand Slam singles title.<\/p>\n
The Belarusian, who has won 10 WTA singles titles, will open her season at this week’s Adelaide International, where she is the second seed behind top-ranked Ashleigh Barty.<\/p>\n
She had never gone past the round of 16 in a Slam until last year, when she reached the semi-finals at Wimbledon and the US Open, losing tough three-setters each time.<\/p>\n
The powerful 23-year-old said nerves had gotten the better of her on both those occasions, but she was determined to go all the way this year.<\/p>\n
“I think those two matches which I lost in the semi-finals was that little step to make this dream come true,” Sabalenka told reporters in Adelaide.<\/p>\n
“I think right now I understand I can do it \u2014 okay, semi-final, I don’t have to overthink or over-rush, panic.<\/p>\n
“Right now I think I’ll not be nervous in the semi-finals again in a Grand Slam.”<\/p>\n
Sabalenka said mistakes had cost her a number of important close matches.<\/p>\n
“I made a winner or I made unforced errors,” she said, adding she was working on becoming more consistent.<\/p>\n
“I just have to focus and try to make less unforced errors than winners. That’s it.<\/p>\n
“Usually I win the first set and then I can start missing a lot, trying to overhit the ball, like make more winners.<\/p>\n
“Then I start losing in the third set and when my opponent gets this feeling that they can beat me, it’s tough.<\/p>\n
“I just have to not try to overhit the ball and just be there from the beginning till the end, don’t give these big opportunities for my opponent.”<\/p>\n
Sabalenka has a first round bye at Adelaide and will play Slovenian Kaja Juvan in the second round.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Adelaide, Australia, 3 Jan (AFP): World number two Aryna Sabalenka said on Monday that she will only consider 2022 a successful year if she can break through and win a maiden Grand Slam singles title. The Belarusian, who has won 10 WTA singles titles, will open her season at this week’s Adelaide International, where she […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-180915","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180915","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180915"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180915\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180915"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180915"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180915"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}