Mauresmo Finds It Helps to Be Looser

Amelie Mauresmo surprises more than most professional tennis players with her performances in the interview room. The fixed, hard-faced look that she wears when she plays is not her at all. Off court, when she relaxes, it is hard to imagine she is the same person. On the outside, nothing much has changed this year.

The muscles in her face still look worryingly taut, the furrows in her brow just as pronounced, as she works her way through a match. On the inside, though, in her mind, she has loosened up to the extent that, at the age of 27, she is at last realising her full potential. 'She was looking outside herself for answers but she already had everything she needed inside,' says Loic Courteau, Mauresmo's coach of four years.

He is trying to explain how France's first world number one in the Open era went 31 grand slams without winning one and has now won two out of three this year, the Australian Open and Wimbledon. When we talked after her Wimbledon win seven weeks ago she agreed that the 'choker' tag that accompanied her for so many years had some validity and learning how to steady her nerves in big matches has not been easy. 'I learnt from my experiences,' she said. 'I learnt how things are, how they work. I learnt to try different things, to think in a way I hadn't before, to see tennis in another light and by doing so not put myself under so much pressure.'

All this thinking, which was once the problem, has now provided her with the means to the solution, even if Christian Bimes, the president of the French Tennis Federation, may be overdoing the positive when he says: 'It's the conclusion of very big work. The problem in her head is finished.' Not so fast, Christian. Mauresmo's defeat by the 17-year-old Czech Nicole Vaidisova in the fourth round of the French Open in early June showed she remains vulnerable.

Mauresmo managed only three more games after winning the first set in a tiebreak. Mauresmo's breakthrough win came when she beat Justine Henin-Hardenne in the Australian Open final in January. If that success was sullied by the Belgian's retirement with a stomach ailment after conceding eight out of nine games, Mauresmo removed lingering doubts about its legitimacy when she came from a set down to beat Henin-Hardenne in the Wimbledon final.

Henin-Hardenne, with a deserved reputation for being as stout a competitor as any on the women's circuit, found Mauresmo's resolve too much for her on a breezy afternoon that called for the steadiest of nerves. Mauresmo's first real test is likely to come in the fourth round, where her opponent will probably be either Serena Williams or Serbia's Ana Ivanovic.

Injury has restricted Williams to six matches this summer and 18- year-old Ivanovic, winner of the US Open Series that consists of the events leading up to Flushing Meadows, may exploit her suspect fitness. If the seedings work out, Mauresmo will then meet Martina Hingis in the quarters and Maria Sharapova in the semis. She may not have a harder match than the one against Sharapova, whose ability to smite the ball harder than most is supplemented by a higher level of fitness and a sound defence.

The prospect of a Belgian winning for the second year running has been only marginally diminished by defending champion Kim Clijsters having to withdraw with a wrist injury. Henin-Hardenne may dominate the bottom half of the draw and be fresher than whoever it is who emerges from the top half. But even a refreshed Henin-Hardenne knows she can longer count on Mauresmo performing like an overwrought novice when a major title is at stake.