Henin-Hardenne Storms Into Women’s Final

Justine Henin-Hardenne is a tennis anomaly. She stands roughly 5-foot-6 and weighs 126 pounds – an inch shorter and about five pounds lighter than Martina Hingis.Yet the 24-year-old Belgian generates as much pace, both on her groundstrokes and on her serve, as any woman in the world.For Henin-Hardenne, torque and timing are everything.If she is off her game, it’s rather ugly to watch – a double fault here, a framed backhand there, arms flailing all over. When she is on, though, no one on the tour plays with as much flair. Her forehand can dominate a match, and her one-handed backhand is perhaps the prettiest stroke in the game, men or women. She can volley well, too, though as of late she prefers to move gracefully along at the baseline.Henin-Hardenne has brought her best stuff to Roland Garros this year.The defending champion trampled fellow Belgian Kim Clijsters in yesterday’s semifinal, reaching her second consecutive French Open final with a 6-3, 6-2 victory. Henin-Hardenne has yet to drop a set and looks almost impossible to beat.Svetlana Kuznetsova will have the last chance. The 20-year-old Russian played so-so tennis yesterday, but in the end showed enough patience to prevail over 17-year-old newcomer Nicole Vaidisova, 5-7, 7-6(5), 6-2. Kuznetsova held two match points against Henin-Hardenne in the fourth round at Roland Garros last year. On Saturday, she will have a chance at revenge and her first French Open title.To win, Kuznetsova cannot have the sort of lapse she did yesterday against Vaidisova. Kuznetsova is a more experienced player and far more comfortable on clay. She used this to her advantage early on, playing safer shots than she normally might and waiting for Vaidisova to strike one of her fearsome drives out of bounds. Serving at 5-3, 30-15, Kuznetsova faltered. She tried for a quick point with a backhand winner down the line and missed. She made another error to lose the game and seven more over the next three games as Vaidisova settled down.After nearly falling behind two breaks in the second set, Kuznetsova returned to grinding, and Vaidisova obliged her with errors. The third set was no contest: Kuznetsova made one error, and finished with 19 for the match after 13 in the first set. For a powerful and often erratic player, it was a tactical triumph.Henin-Hardenne, by contrast, did not need much strategy. Most of her shots were working, and most of Clijsters’s were not.Clijsters,who turned 23 yesterday, looked flat and almost disoriented, never threatening Henin-Hardenne after the third game of the match. Henin- Hardenne won 76% of points on her serve, despite making only 44% of her first serves. She did exceptionally well when those serves went in, winning 18 of 22 points. On her second serve, she won 71%, a remarkable percentage and a sign that Clijsters was not sharp.For Clijsters, losing in the semifinals at the French Open was by no means a poor showing, but this match might linger in her mind. Where was the dogged Clijsters who scrambled her way to a major title at last year’s U.S. Open? She spoke this week about going for more and trying to end points quickly, with the hope of reducing the wear on her oft-injured body. Once the hardcourt season rolls around this summer, we will have a better sense of where she stands.After yesterday, there’s no question that Henin-Hardenne stands alone on clay. During her title run last year, she often looked out of sorts. She struggled in the first round and again in the third, and had to save two match points in the fourth against Kuznetsova.This year? The Belgian has lost just 12 service games while amassing 32 breaks; she has won 59% of the points she has played. For Kuznetsova to win, she will have to serve much better than she did yesterday, play just as steady as she did in sets two and three, and take a few more calculated risks. For Henin swallow a handful of the anti-inflammatories that upset her stomach during the Australian Open final (she promised not to). As sick as she was that day, Henin-Hardenne should not have quit, and she will jump at the chance to put that disaster of a final behind her.No matter the winner on Saturday, a bit of history will come to an end. We mentioned at the start of this tournament that eight different women had won the last eight major titles, a record in the Open Era and one shy of the alltime record, last achieved in 1939. Henin-Hardenne and Kuznetsova are both part of that streak, so on Saturday it will disappear. If only Vaidisova had won that second set tiebreaker…tperrotta@nysun.com

Henin-Hardenne Storms Into Women’s Final

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