By Mark Winters
Roland Garros – Petra Kvitova returned to tennis May 28th, after having survived a knife attack by an intruder who invaded her home last December. The assault resulted in extensive damage to her left (playing) hand that required surgery and extensive rehabilitation. The match she played, the first day of the tournament, was her first competitive appearance since winning the Elite Trophy title early last November. Her opponent was an American named Julia Boserup.
Kvitova, a two-time Wimbledon champion, who was born in Bilovec, Czechoslovakia, but resides in Monte Carlo, triumphed 6-3, 6-2 in seventy-four minutes. While the victory was emotionally captivating, there was another story that wasn’t the one that Kvitova has lived through. That story will provide an answer to the question – “Who is Julia Boserup?”
It is quite an interesting tale. Ranked 86 today, (but she will move up to 85 tomorrow when the new WTA rankings are released), the Southern Californian calls Newport Beach home, (That claim can be validated by the fact that the Newport Beach Tennis Club is her training base.), was making her Roland Garros debut. The daughter of Viggo and Anne-Marie Boserup, who are Danish, enjoys dual citizenship (US and Danish). In fact, prior to the start of our interview, she spoke in Danish with a representative of Copenhagen’s Ekstra Bladet newspaper, about the match with Kvitova.
“When I saw her name in the draw, I wasn’t sure if she was going to play because she was still recovering from her injury,” Boserup said. “Though I don’t really know her, she is one of the nicest girls on the tour.”
In 2007, the two players tangled for the first time on grass (Boserup’s favorite surface) at the junior championship staged at Roehampton. Kvitova won that contest, too.
There can’t be a comparison made to the horrific injuries which Kvitova has had to endure. Boserup, though, has had her career stalled by a myriad of physical issues. Mononucleosis kept her sidelined for almost an entire year. Then she had to deal with stress fractures in both feet for a lengthy period of time and the situation was compounded by problems with a bulging spinal disk. She is now 25-years-old, but in tennis terms she is more than three years younger, having spent that amount of time visiting doctors and away from the court.
“The last year, I have been healthy and have been able to play a full schedule of tournaments (24 in 2016),” she admitted.
Boserup qualified at the 2017 Australian Open and lost her second-round match to Elina Svitolina of Ukraine, but the experience was meaningful from the perspective of trading strokes with a “name” opponent on a show court. “I played on Margaret Court (Arena) and it helped me (cope with) today,” she said.
But, Court Philippe Chatrier, which seats almost 15,000, is cavernous. There is so much space behind the base and sidelines that a player can become disoriented because of the seeming never-ending openness.
“Going into the match, I was both nervous and excited, and it showed because I missed some shots that I ordinarily make,” Boserup explained. “It was incredible to play on Chatrier, and I tried to soak it all up. It will help me the next time I am in a situation like this. I thought the crowd would really support her because of all she had been through, but they were very fair. When a good shot was hit, it didn’t matter which player did it, they responded.”
She joked that when it came to red clay, her approach was unique. “I practice on green clay (Har-Tru) and pretend that it is red.” (Players often describe the surface as gravelly and cumbersome compared to the smooth texture of terre battue.)
At the end of the match, the players exchanged warm words. “I congratulated her for being back,” Boserup said. “She has been courageous dealing with all she has been through, and I am very happy for her.”
Noting that it was “special” to be part of a feature encounter, Boserup added that she would now head for England and turn her attention to the grass court season. It will be a homecoming of sorts since she will be playing on her favourite surface, in preparation for her favourite tournament, “Wimbledon”, where she achieved her best Grand Slam result reaching the third-round in 2016.
All in all, it was a great day for Kvitova, but Boserup will be able to do more than put a checkmark in her personal loss column. She will always have the wonderful memory of playing the opening tournament match on Court Philippe Chatrier at the 2017 Roland Garros.
