'Unreal' Webb upsets top seed Saito in 'match to remember'
Japan’s Sara Saito is the top-seeded player in the girls’ tournament at the Australian Open this year. She has played in the last two Billie Jean King Cups and won the Osaka Mayor’s Cup last October.
On Sunday she found herself first match - with an 11am start - on court 16 right at the back of Melbourne Park.
It has just one stand (albeit sizeable) running along one side of the court and is hemmed in by the 10,000 seat John Cain Arena, the brand new sunken showcase Kia Arena and a mass of railway lines taking commuters to all parts of Melbourne and beyond. Two hundred metres away at most the Melbourne Cricket Ground is in full view.
She will have given little thought to her opponent from Melbourne’s northern suburbs. Stefani Webb has just completed her final year of school and missed much of 2022 to focus on her studies, as directed by mum and dad.
She was injured a lot too last year and played just 10 tournaments. Her ranking accordingly, at 187, is low. It is also supremely misleading.
Webb, backed by a vociferous and partisan crowd, defied the rankings and all logic to overcome Saito in three sets and moved into the last 32. Saito did not play badly at all but Webb was a worthy winner. In fact she was fantastic, uplifting, gutsy and talented. Indeed she deserves every superlative for her 6-3 1-6 6-2 win in 93 minutes.
“It was unreal, the court was unreal, the crowd, the atmosphere,” she said. “The three sides, I kind of liked it. There were so many people there. I’m an Aussie, I have played all over Melbourne Park but never there.
“It’s the biggest crowd I have played before, insane.”
Her fitness coach Betty was in her box court-side along with her brother but her parents, nervous as anything, were elsewhere, dad stood away from the action high up on a walkway looking down on the court.
“It’s my parents dream and my dream, a match to remember,” she said.
Set one was done and dusted in a flash to Webb - who looks fearsome on court but is a vibrant and chatty teen off outside - but she lost the second as Saito gathered herself.
It was time to re think on Webb’s part.
“I went off at the end of the second set to the toilet, I needed some sugar. I felt my body was struggling,” she said.
“I had to get the crowd involved, it was getting a little dull. I just said I have to make every ball, ‘Come on Stef’. It was a dream match.”
Sadly she came into the match after a family bereavement.
“I lost my grandmother a few days ago. I had no expectations coming into the match. My grandmother's name is Elenora and it is my middle name. I am just so proud of my performance.”
It was impossible to surpass such a story and credit to both players for a match that would have graced the final.
Elsewhere, Japan’s seventh-seed Hayato Matsuoka was knocked out an hour after her compatriot Saito, taking just three games against the USA’s Learner Tien.
Number four seed Nikola Daubnerova was another high-profile casualty, managing just three games in a 63-minute loss to Germany’s Ella Seidel.
A day of the unexpected all round.