If anyone deserves to win the Australian Open, it is Li Na.
And few have done so more impressively than Li in her straight-sets defeat of Slovakia’s Dominika Cibulkova.
Even so, the 31-year-old still sent flutters through the hearts of the billion-or-so in China who tuned in to Saturday’s match and watched their hero rise, fall and rise again.
After leading and losing at her previous two attempts, the woman who is perhaps the most influential in world tennis put the record straight with a 7-6 (7-3) 6-0 victory.
Li has almost single-handedly carried Chinese tennis to prominence.
She was the first Chinese to win a tournament on the main world tour, the first to play in a grand slam final, the first to make the world’s top 10 and in 2011 she became the first to win a grand slam final when she broke through at the French Open.
But this is the one she coveted most.
Three years ago, she won the first set of her final against Kim Clijsters only to fold.
A year ago, it was the same against Victoria Azarenka. This time, though, she had an excuse after falling and striking her head so heavily on the court that she was concussed.
This time she again raced to an early lead before handing it back to Cibulkova with some sloppy, nervous play, and then snatching it back again in the tiebreak.
Li then got it all together in the second set as Cibulkova unravelled.
And then came an acceptance speech more entertaining than her tennis.
With disarming frankness, Li thanked her agent “for making me rich”.
She thanked the sponsors, her coach, the largest fan base in the game and, almost as an afterthought, her husband and former coach Jiang Shan who has sat through so many televised tantrums and publicly borne the brunt of so many disappointments.
“You are famous in China,” Li told him.
And then to the crowd at courtside she praised him.
“He gave up everything to be my hitting partner, to fix the drinks and fix the racquet,” she said.
He clearly did it all well.