Wine lover Amelie Mauresmo bought a special bottle years ago in anticipation of winning her first Grand Slam title.
She can finally pop open the 69-year-old bottle after ailing Justine Henin-Hardenne called it quits during their Australian Open final yesterday while trailing 6-1, 2-0.
In an anticlimactic finish that stunned the packed Rod Laver Arena crowd, Henin-Hardenne retired with stomach pain from anti-inflammatories that she's been taking for her sore right shoulder.
PHOTO: AP
"Everything really came together here," said Mauresmo, adding that the first set may have been the best that she's ever played in a big match.
"I was focusing on really what I had to do and taking control of the points the way I did for the whole match and really not paying really much of an attention to how she felt."
It was a bit of karma for the 26-year-old Mauresmo, who has suffered through her own ailments -- and occasional jitters -- while seeking her first major final since losing here in 1999 to Martina Hingis.
PHOTO: AFP
She also benefited when semifinal opponent Kim Clijsters tore a ligament in her ankle in the third set Thursday, and Michaela Krajicek wilted in their third-round match with heat exhaustion.
"Things turn around at some point," said Mauresmo, who played her first Grand Slam event in 1995 at age 15. "In France we say, `The sadness of some makes the happiness of others.'"
On the men's side, top-ranked Roger Federer, seeking his seventh Grand Slam title and third in a row, will face 54th-ranked Marcos Baghdatis on Sunday.
After losing two straight Australian Open doubles finals, top-seeded Bob and Mike Bryan had a 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 victory Saturday over seventh-seeded Leander Paes and Martin Damm.
Known for getting tight at crucial times, Mauresmo really had nothing to get nervous about this time. She won 19 of the first 24 points en route to a 5-0 lead.
Henin-Hardenne called the trainer after falling behind 2-0 in the second set and played only two more points.
"Last night I was feeling so bad I thought I would have to go to see a doctor at 3 in the morning because I was such in pain," said Henin-Hardenne, who went into the match on a 13-match Melbourne Park winning streak.
"I knew at the beginning of the match I couldn't win it. You always want to try because you know it's a Grand Slam final," she said. "If I would have kept playing, maybe I would injure something else. I have no regrets."
Mauresmo had the second-longest wait for her first major title in the Open era, 32 Grand Slam events. Jana Novotna won Wimbledon in 1998, her 45th major.
"I worked so hard, came close many times," Mauresmo said. "Finally this is it. Finally!"
She said she doesn't get to drink much of her beloved wine but bought a 1937 bottle of Chateau d'Yquem sauterne three or four years ago, planning to open it when she finally broke through.
"It's there, it's at home in the dark lying there quietly," she said. "Now I have to open it."
Henin-Hardenne has four Grand Slam singles titles, including the 2004 Australian Open crown that she couldn't defend last year due to injury. She burst into tears when she reached a courtside chair after quitting.
"I don't know what is harder, to lose even when you're playing well or when you have to retire like that," Henin-Hardenne said.
Despite a recent rash of injuries, she said she doesn't feel jinxed and hopes she'll be well enough in a few days to start playing again.
Storms outside produced the only thunder of the match. The stadium roof was closed, trapping several birds inside, and they chirped loudly throughout.
There were only nine combined winners in the nine games and 31 unforced errors, 20 by Henin-Hardenne. Her shoulders repeatedly slumped after missing shots that she normally would have been smacking for winners.
A 33-stroke rally in the second game of the second set was the final straw. She won the point on an error from Mauresmo, but lost the next two to surrender the game.
"I was dead," Henin-Hardenne said.
Mauresmo spoke to her at the net and embraced her after she quit.
Mauresmo then sat and hung her head, seemingly stunned and overwhelmed. She finally got up and rose her arms in triumph, choking back her own tears of emotion, as French flags fluttered in the stands, still looking less than triumphant as Henin-Hardenne continued to weep.
But as the victory started to sink in, Mauresmo's smile got wider and wider.
"There were tough moments," Mauresmo said. "A lot of people in the press were saying, `She's not going to get there.'"
Now she has vindication.
"The joy is here. I'm probably the proudest woman for now."
Bob and Mike Bryan won their second consecutive Grand Slam doubles title on Saturday, using their recent experience on vital points to beat Leander Paes and Martin Damm 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 at the Australian Open.
The top-seeded Bryan brothers, who won the United States Open title last September, captured their first title in Melbourne and their third Grand Slam doubles crown together.
The American twin brothers were contesting their third successive final at the Australian Open, having lost the previous two. Their other Grand Slam title came at the 2003 French Open.
"It's unbelievable. I had nothing left in my body by the end of that match," said Bob Bryan.
The Bryans, who have played together for 10 years, were also contesting their fifth consecutive Grand Slam tournament final.
The Bryans are the first team to back-to-back Grand Slam titles since Todd Woodbridge and Jonas Bjorkman won the 2003 Wimbledon and US Open titles.
OH SO LONELY
Marcos Baghdatis' run through to the men's final at the Australian Open has featured his smiling face prominently.
But the 20-year-old from Cyprus hasn't always been so happy. When he left home at 13 and headed to Paris to train at the Mouratoglou tennis academy, Baghdatis said he struggled with loneliness.
His first day there was "the worst day, one of the worst days of my life," Baghdatis said yesterday.
``I was just crying all the way, and all the day I was crying with my father ... the only thing I wanted to do is go back and see my family, see my friends,'' he added.
"The first two or three months were very tough. I felt lonely, felt bad, felt I wasn't happy, I wasn't enjoying it."
So what turned it around?
"You just wake up one day and you realize ... it's life and you just want to go through it," he said. "I did and I had the right people around me.
"I just woke up one day and said `OK, I have no choice, stop crying. You have no choice and you can do it. A lot of people believe in you', and that's what I did."
Today, Baghdatis -- who was rated at odds of 500-to-one at the start of the tournament -- faces No. 1 Roger Federer for the title at Rod Laver Arena.
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