Sabalenka needs to find balance for major success, says Dokic
Aryna Sabalenka has all the weapons to win a Grand Slam but
the Belarusian needs to strike a balance between unleashing the power and
opting for the safer shot, former world number four Jelena Dokic said.
Sabalenka, 23, has won 10 titles on the WTA Tour and reached
consecutive major semi-finals at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open this year.
She won 45 matches in 2021, picked up two titles at Abu
Dhabi and Madrid and rose to a career-high ranking of second.
"I think she's got the quality to do it, I think her
game is massive," Dokic, who retired from playing in 2014, told the
Australian Open website https://ausopen.com. "You have to have a weapon to
win a Grand Slam, and she's got quite a few of them.
"But I think for her it's about balance. It's about, at
times, pulling back from what her natural instinct is, and harnessing those
weapons in the right way. Even taking 20per cent off her groundstrokes, she
would still hit massive shots."
Before this year's Wimbledon Sabalenka had never made it past
the fourth round at a Grand Slam, prompting some to raise questions about her
temperament.
Dokic said Sabalenka had a tendency to resort to power when
under pressure, which contributes to her error count.
That appeared to be the case at the U.S. Open, where she
double faulted twice while serving at 4-5 in the last set of her semi-final
against Leylah Fernandez.
Sabalenka would later send a forehand long for another
unforced error to hand the Canadian victory.
"I'm not saying that she shouldn't be aggressive, but
you just don't need to take the unnecessary risk," said Australian Dokic,
who made the last four at Wimbledon in 2000.
"If she can learn one thing from this year, that would
be it. In those big moments, the worst thing you can do is hit 10 double
faults, and hit 20 unforced errors, in a third set."
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