There's no question that 2015 was The Year of Serena. She went 51-3 and finished two wins shy of the Grand Slam. What does she have for an encore in 2016? Well, if her first-round match at the Australian Open, her first match period since the US Open, was any indication, it once again looks as if the tennis world is her oyster.
Serena Williams has reached the point where if she's on her game, she's expected to win every tournament she plays. Last year, she wasn't healthy in every tournament, and she still won! I don't think she'll get away with that in 2016, though. The other top women look really good and if Serena has an off day, she could be susceptible to an upset.
It would be a stretch to say Serena isn't the favorite Down Under, though. So has been her dominance. Although, despite having six titles, she's only won here back-to-back once (2009-10). Another player that's won back-to-back Australian Opens is Victoria Azarenka, and it looks like Vika's back in form after missing some time due to injury and seeing her ranking drop as a result. And Vika's on the other side of the draw, so that's the easy matchup to project as the women's final.
However, it's never that easy. Petra Kvitova had no problems in her first-round match and Dominika Cibulkova, who was a finalist two years ago, has a favorable draw. Those two would meet in the third round, and I expect the winner to meet Serena in the semis. In the quarterfinals, we could have a rematch of the 2015 final between Serena and Maria Sharapova. They're the two biggest names in women's tennis, but when they play, the result is always the same.
On the bottom half of the women's draw, you'd be a fool not to like Azarenka to make a deep run. She'll run into plenty of challengers, though. Second-ranked Simona Halep, for example, has been to the quarters in each of the last two years, and she was a semifinalist at the US Open. Third-ranked Garbine Muguruza, the 2015 Wimbledon finalist, is also a player on the rise. Then there are the Germans--Angelique Kerber and Sabine Lisicki. They've both gone deep in Majors before, and I wouldn't be surprised to see either one on the final weekend.
I'm obviously going with Serena to make the semis, where she'll meet Cibulkova. On the other side, I've got Kerber vs. Azarenka and Lisicki vs. Halep in the quarters. Then Kerber beats Halep in the semis before losing to Serena in the final. Williams wins her seventh Australian Open, her fifth Major in the last six, and her 22nd overall, tying her with Steffi Graf for second-most all-time.
While we were all getting swept up in Serena and her quest for the Grand Slam, it was easy to overlook Novak Djokovic's 2015 season. He was just as dominant, if not more so, coming a bad match in the French Open final short of winning the Grand Slam on the men's side. And the Australian Open has always been his best Slam tournament, so you'd have to think it's his tournament to lose.
Djokovic is a five-time champion, and they've all come in the past eight years. In fact, he's won four of the last five, and his only Australian Open loss since 2011 was that memorable quarterfinal against Wawrinka in 2014 that went to 9-7 in the fifth. And it was Stan Wawrinka, of course, that beat Djokovic in the 2015 French Open final. I've got that as the final here with Wawrinka winning, but there are plenty of other scenarios that are completely plausible.
Andy Murray has had more success here over the past decade than anybody. Except he's never won a title. Four trips to the finals (all since 2010), all losses. You know the French is the one Djokovic wants. You'd have to figure Australia's the one Murray wants.
While I'm talking about Andy Murray, what a performance he put on in the 2015 Davis Cup! He won every one of his matches throughout the four rounds of the event to lead Great Britain to its first title since 1936. Now all five of the Big Five have a Davis Cup championship on their resume. And four of the five have an Olympic gold, which is another thing Djokovic can take care of in 2016.
Anyway, back to the Australian Open. Roger Federer had his streak of 11 consecutive years in the semifinals snapped last year, but he recovered to lose to Djokovic in those classic Wimbledon and US Open finals. Are the days of Roger Federer winning Grand Slams over? I don't know. His problem doesn't seem to be Nadal anymore. It seems to be that he keeps having to play Djokovic. Sure enough, that's the case again in Melbourne, as they're seeded to meet in the semis. They'll play that at night, which will prevent the heat from being a factor, but that "rivalry" is becoming very one-sided.
The quarter that includes two of the Big Five includes Wawrinka and Nadal. Nadal's only won this title once and in recent years has become more likely to be upset than make a deep run at every Grand Slam other than the French. The draw didn't help his case this year, either. Since he's ranked fifth, he'll theoretically have to beat three of the other four to win the title. In this case, it'd go Wawrinka, Murray, Djokovic/Federer. I just don't see that happening.
Picking the chalk has become too easy on the men's side, but that's exactly what I'm doing. Nobody in Djokovic's section is going to challenge him before Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the quarters, and I'm not even sure how big of a test that'll be. Federer has his foil Tomas Berdych lurking in his section of the draw, so if that match happens, Roger could be in trouble. Berdych has to get by both Nick Kyrgios and Marin Cilic first, though, so Roger might not have to worry about him after all.
Wawrinka and Nadal should get to each other no problem. As for what will happen when they play in the quarterfinals, I really have no idea. It'll likely depend on the amount of time they've each spent on court and how taxing their first four matches are. Likewise, I don't think Murray has any problems getting to at least the semis, although he does have potentially tough matches with Bernard Tomic and John Isner.
Just like Serena-Vika's the easy final pick on the women's side, it's an easy pick to say Djokovic-Murray on the men's side. I'm saying Djokovic-Wawrinka, though. And you know what happens when Novak Djokovic plays Stan Wawrinka in Grand Slams? Wawrinka wins. He earns his second Aussie Open title in three years and extends the run that these two have been on to six straight.
Also, one final shout out to Lleyton Hewitt. He announced his retirement last year, but wanted to play in one last Australian Open. A two-time Grand Slam champion and former world No. 1, he was the great hope for an Aussie to finally win their home tournament for the first time since 1976. But, alas, whether it was the pressure or the surface or something else, he never did win the Australian Open. He did make the finals once--in 2005--but lost to Marat Safin. He won't win this year, either, but he deserves to go out with a hero's ovation after his final match, which will almost certainly be on Rod Laver Arena at night.
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