The four-time Slam champion is ready to immerse herself in the game as her comeback begins.
By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Friday January 12, 2024
Naomi Osaka’s comeback will hit another gear this week in Australia, with the pressure and expectations of the season’s first Slams upon her as all eyes seek to get a true glimpse of what kind of form the four-time Grand Slam champion can summon after more than a year away from the game.
If you happen to miss Osaka this week, don’t worry, the 26-year-old mother of one says she is planning to play a heavy schedule in 2024.
“I’m definitely thinking this year that I want to play a lot of tournaments,” she told reporters atm media day at the Australian Open. “I might go back to the schedule I had when I was, like, 18 or something. I think right now I really need to play a lot of matches and it will probably condition me to at least have a really good end of the year.
“For me right now, my schedule’s kind of packed with the tournaments that I want to play.”
All smiles: Two-time Australian Open champ @Naomiosaka is back in Melbourne pic.twitter.com/lCDcBaBiNr
— Jimmie48 Photography (@JJlovesTennis) January 12, 2024
Round 1 Clash vs Garcia in Melbourne
Osaka, who went 1-1 at Brisbane in her first event of the year, is slated to face France’s Caroline Garcia, the No.16 seed, in round one.
She knows she’ll have her hands full with the former World No.3.
“I think it’s definitely tough, of course,” Osaka, who defeated Garcia in their only previous meeting at the Australian Open, 6-2, 6-3, in 2021, said. “She’s seeded. Whenever I play her, I always think she’s an incredible player. She has every shot that a top-five player needs.
“My immediate thought was, ‘Okay, this is tough,’ but I definitely think I can achieve what I want to achieve. Hopefully during the match I’m able to, I guess, have things go my way. In a weird way I’m glad I’m playing a seed so that hopefully, if I get through that, the next match won’t be as difficult.”
Working on the Return and the Backhand
Osaka talked about the progress she is currently making, and how she wants to continue improving two keys to her game: the return and the backhand.
“I think my match against Pliskova (a loss in Brisbane) kind of showed me that I have a really good serve, but if my return can just be, like, 10 percent better [it would help me],” she said. “I think I had a lot of break points. Just to convert, like, three of them would have made the match a whole lot different.
“I really tried to focus on my return. I tried to focus on my backhand a lot now, hitting with [Amanda] Anisimova [in a practice session] and trading backhands was really fun. Yeah, honestly I can go on and on about stuff that I want to, I guess, perfect. I can almost say like it’s everything. But those are probably the two things right now.”
