After her gutsy performance against Serena Williams at the Australian Open on Friday, Sania Mirza took heart from the fact that she could match the six-time Grand Slam champion stroke for stroke on tennis' big stage.
"It was good to know that I can match her. I had some good chances, but she took her chances when it counted," Mirza said, after going down 1-6, 4-6 to the American seventh seed in the women's singles third round at the Vodafone Arena.
The 18-year old Hyderabad girl, ranked 166 on the WTA Tour, is the first Indian woman to reach this far in a Grand Slam event.
She put up a spirited display in the second set, in which she forced three break-points and saved two match-points. Serena, however, raised her game when it mattered and maintained her straight-set win record in the tournament.
"That is the difference between girls in the top 10 and the rest of us. She played the big points better," said Mirza, who earned Aus $46,250, the biggest pay cheque of her career.
She grabbed 66 WTA points, equivalent to winning eleven $10,000 titles, that should push her ranking to around 130 when the rankings are updated at the end of the month.
Mirza said she did feel nervous in the lead-up to what she had described as the "biggest match of her life".
"I had butterflies in my stomach for two days. I couldn't get sleep last night. In the first set, I was very tight. But I was more confident as I got the feel of play. I had fun," she said.
The 2003 Wimbledon girls' doubles champion said she missed her parents, who are on Haj pilgrimage.
"Their prayers have obviously been with me because I got to the third round. Unfortunately, they haven't been able to see me play, but I have been speaking to them a lot on the phone," added the teenager.
Mirza was hopeful that her exploits on the banks of the Yarra river would inspire confidence in her compatriots.
"If I can do it, anyone can do it. That is what this should mean to the other girls [in India]," she declared.
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