MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) – For both the veteran, Mirjana Lucic-Baroni, and the newcomer, Jennifer Brady, it’s a completely unexpected position to be in: Playing for a spot in the quarterfinals of the Australian Open.
How they ended up here, however, couldn’t be more dramatically different.
Lucic-Baroni has been on this stage before, another lifetime ago, when she made a dream run to the Wimbledon semifinals in 1999 at the age of 17. Soon after, she was out of the sport entirely and was forced to spend years scraping her way back to the majors.
Brady, meanwhile, is experiencing everything for the first time – winning a match at a major, telling her life story at packed news conferences.
Now, one will advance to the quarters – a spot neither could have imagined at the start of the year.