At Alizé Cornet, precocity only had a time. First match won at Roland-Garros at 15, scientific baccalaureate at 16, member of the top 20 in the world just of age, the Frenchwoman grilled the stages before somewhat slowing down. At 32, she has finally just forced the doors of a Grand Slam quarter-final at her 63and attempt, after her victory, Monday, January 24, at the Australian Open against the Romanian Simona Halep (6-3, 3-6, 6-4).
Kneeling on the hot floor of the Rod Laver Arena and looking incredulously at his camp in the stands, Cornet cashes in on the excess of emotion after a 2:33 fight in the furnace of Melbourne against the former world number 1. “After thirty minutes of the match, we were both already cooked but we continued to fight”, described the Niçoise at a press conference.
This round of 16, she almost let it slip away like the previous six in a major tournament. At 6-3, 3-1 and play point, Cornet experiences a power outage and loses 19 of the next 20 points. But the 30-year-old went back to fighting, even if she couldn’t see it ” clearer ” by 33 degrees in full sun.
One of the hardest workers on tour. Take a bow @alizecornet, you’ve earned this moment 👏👏 #AusOpen #AO2022 https://t.co/08oTJFAn17
Of his next opponent, Cornet tries not to know anything, starting with the name, like an Adrian Mannarino, a specialist in the genre and capable of having lunch with his future rival without even knowing it. She justified this new approach after her victory in the round of 16 against Slovenian Tamara Zidansek. “I realize that when I know him, I think about it right away and I forget to take advantage of the great victory that has just happened. » Wednesday, January 26, the American Danielle Collins therefore (seeded noh 30) awaits him for a place in the semi-finals. Nothing insurmountable on paper.
Stroke of spleen a year ago
” Sky is the limit. For the first time in my life, I really have the feeling that I can go all the way.”, announces the Frenchwoman, 61and world player. And why not ? In permanent revolution, current women’s tennis invites you to dream even out loud. Last season, the Briton Emma Raducanu conquered New York and the US Open well by coming out of the qualifications and Barbora Krejcikova had beaten her to Roland-Garros, surprising even the most discerning exegetes of Czech tennis.
Like so many others before her, Alizé Cornet wondered what she was doing on a court. This big shot of spleen goes back to the last… Australian Open. “I’m tired of being disappointed, of going back to work and sometimes of being unreasonable”, confessed this emotional with whom everything reads like an open book after his elimination at the 2and round against the American Ann Li. The word “retirement” comes up several times. The French hesitates to re-enlist for a 17and season, tired of this nomadic life between a health bubble and a PCR test. Finally, she resumed her bag for a final season or more, if results and affinities.
Alizé Cornet has never left anyone indifferent. Makes sense when you ignore lukewarm water. Some welcome outspokenness, others sigh. When she worries in November about the fate of the Chinese Peng Shuai, she says aloud what others think lower down of the many tournaments organized in the Middle Kingdom. “The conditions are terrible, it’s very polluted, we breathe three packs of cigarettes per game when we play”, she attacks in The Team. At the start of this Australian Open, she regretted the lack of solidarity of the players after the eventful departure of Novak Djokovic.
If the player has played a character, it goes back to her ten years and a first role in the successful series on France 2 The Institute, with Gerard Klein. In the episode “Terre beaten”, Alizé camped there “Alizée”, prodigy of the yellow ball under the influence of a father obsessed with his success. A storyline of pure fiction. Among the Cornets, tennis is not seen as a social lift and studies take precedence.
“There are things that I understood about myself by writing them down”
From the love of reading transmitted by her mother, Patricia, the player moved on to that of writing. In 2019, she keeps a diary between Wimbledon at the start of the summer and the victory of Les Bleues in the Fed Cup in December, a catharsis at the time of yet another period of doubt. Without compromise was released the following spring by Amphora editions. “There are things that I understood about myself by writing them, she then confided to the Parisian. Like therapy. writing and meditation [qu’elle pratique quotidiennement] helped me to take a step back… I tend to lower myself to the ground and there, I may have the right to turn around and be proud. »
Yes, the step turned out to be a bit high to take over from a Mary Pierce or Amélie Mauresmo, but Cornet knocked on the door of the top 10 (11and in 2009) and won three titles on the circuit. Caroline Garcia and Kristina Mladenovic who have been lacking results for three years, Fiona Ferro hampered by injuries and Clara Burel still a little tender, Cornet the thirty-year-old still maintains the flame of French women’s tennis, of which she will again become number 1 in the rankings at the end. of this Australian Open.
But above all, she has three last chapters to write on the court to imitate her childhood idol, Amélie Mauresmo, winner in Melbourne in 2006.
