MELBOURNE – Often as we talk in terms of backhands, forehand serves, there are other, less easily quantified tennis gifts. Take relentlessness, which was the theme of the day on Thursday at the 2020 Australian Open. Two women and one (super)man won their semifinals matches simply with a refusal to be the second-best player on the court.
• Sonia Kenin got the day started not so much by winning, but by defiantly refusing to be beaten. The 21-year-old Floridian, seeded 14, outlasted Ash Barty, the top seed, thereby extinguishing Australia’s hope of furnishing its first homegrown champion since the 1970s.