In the middle of the night, on court 7, Clara Burel, 357th in the world, had no notion of time. She was unaware that it was already Tuesday when she won the first match of her Grand Slam career against the Dutch Arantxa Rus (6-7, 7-6, 6-3). At 0h10, she threw herself in tears in her mother’s arms.
“Of course, at the end, when I saw my mother, I thought back to last year when I was watching Roland Garros and had just had my wrist operated, it was difficult. It was a lot of emotions, “said Clara Burel at a press conference. La Bretonne – she is from Louannec – had experienced a prosperous 2018 among the juniors. If she had failed twice in the final of a Grand Slam – the Australian Open and then the US Open – she had won the Masters in Chengdu, pocketing the honorary title of world junior champion.
But the passage on the senior circuit was going to be disrupted by a nasty injury to the left wrist. To the point of going on the operating table in the spring of 2019. A complicated mental ordeal to live so young. But the Bretonne, not very demonstrative on a court, has granite character … pink like the place where she likes to relax.
At the start of the year, she won a $ 15,000 in Grenoble. The dynamic is re-engaged … until confinement. As soon as the courts are reopened, Thierry Champion will spend some time in Perros-Guirec (Côtes d’Amor) to polish the nugget. After getting her socks dirty on the clay courts of Saint-Malo, Cagnes and Strasbourg, Clara Burel was logically awarded a wild card. In Alsace, she won her first victory on the WTA circuit. The second stage was a success in a Major, much more media-oriented. Failing to have been greeted by an unforgettable ovation.
Revenge against Juvan?
“There was a good atmosphere because there were a lot of people on my side, a bit all the people who train me every day. It was really nice to have their support, she explained. is true that I’m more used to playing on courts a bit like this, a bit small, with few people. It wasn’t a huge change for me. I’m more used to playing in those kinds of conditions. “
On Wednesday, in the second round, she will find Kaja Juvan, who deprived her of a gold medal. Indeed, two years ago, she lost to this 20-year-old Slovenian in the final of the Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires. There will be revenge in the air.
