Kerber beat Karolina Pliskova 6-3 4-6 6-4 in Arthur Ashe Stadium on Saturday to edge a nail-biting final and seal her second grand slam title this year. She also turned up at New York Fashion Week, which has been in full swing.
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Wawrinka, the 31-year-old third seed, triumphed 6-7 (1/7), 6-4, 7-5, 6-3 after nearly four hours of high intensity tennis.
Kerber, who has now added the US Open crown to the Australian Open title she claimed in January, became the first German woman to clinch the title since Steff Graffi claimed the last of her five Flushing Meadows crowns in 1996.
But Kerber proved too steady an opponent – in the first set, the 28-year-old German committed just three unforced errors.
That it would happen at Flushing Meadows is fitting. “Once she beat Serena in Australia, everybody thought, “Oh, we have a chance”.
Her game is hardly spectacular – one recalls that Heather Watson should comfortably have beaten her at last year’s Miami Open – but she has turned herself into an incredible counter puncher from the back of the court.
We both felt the demanding match that we played, but he came out on top, he was the better player, tougher mentally.. It was her first final, she had dropped her ranking in 2015, and was a surprise finalist after a mediocre year.
The Sharapova episode has added to the sense that 2016 will go down as a year of high profile absences in women’s tennis, while 2017 may become known as that of the comeback. It has been quite a turnaround for a player who did not play into the second week at any of the four grand slams a year ago.
And that run in Melbourne nearly never happened. Kerber got broken early in the third and bounced her racket off the court. “That was a really special match”.
Kerber has kept in close touch with Graf and says she received a text from her before her latest success.
Like Muguruza, Kerber initially struggled after the shock to the system of winning the Australian Open unexpectedly, but the slump proved only temporary.
“For sure, when I was growing up, Steffi was my idol”, Kerber said.
She made another final at Wimbledon, playing well but losing the rematch with Williams because, as Kerber put it, “Serena was the better player on this day”.
Pliskova, gaining in confidence, grabbed her first break of the match for a 4-3 lead, lofting a lob over the dejected German.
The 28-year-old had the opportunity to displace Serena Williams from the number one position when she took on the Czech player in the final of the Cincinnati Masters in August 2016.
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If Williams can overcome a knee injury, the 22-time major champion could reclaim top spot this autumn given she has very few ranking points to defend after hardly featuring at the end of previous year. She’s always serving to the backhand. She received a title in Fed Cup scoring a straight set round against Switzerland.
