Madison Keys has joined the long list of iconic players to have won a Grand Slam title, having beaten Aryna Sabalenka in the Australian Open final.
Keys’ honesty has impressed Andy Roddick, with the former having shot to seventh in the WTA rankings with her Australian Open success.
Emma Navarro could emulate Keys by winning a Grand Slam title in 2025, but for now the limelight remains on the latter.
The 29-year-old was competing in her second Grand Slam final, having lost the 2017 US Open final to fellow American Sloane Stephens.
Keys beat the likes of Elena Rybakina and Iga Swiatek in Melbourne this time around, before a final victory over world number one Sabalenka.
Madison Keys told she played better at Adelaide International than Australian Open
The Belarusian had just won the Brisbane International, while the American had triumphed at the Adelaide International.
Keys’ coach and husband Bjorn Fratangelo has now shared an insight into their recent journey, saying on the Served with Andy Roddick podcast: “I just felt from a tennis side I needed to work her brain so it wasn’t so Slam-centric to where it was like the other tournaments matter too.
“Now you see, she has played the week before Slams and all her titles with me, except for AO, have been the week before Slams, where she would have never played before.
“We had to have a couple of hard conversations where we were like let’s be real, when you go into a Grand Slam there are five to eight people who can realistically win the tournament.
“I said do you think you are one of these people? If the answer is no then let’s go play these 500’s because there are 500 points just sitting there.
“The Strasbourg title she won on clay last year before Roland Garros, you got a bye, you won four matches to win the 500, she played unreal the whole tournament and probably took four hours and 15 minutes on court that week and there’s 500 points.
“A lot of girls were tapping out because they wanted to get to wherever the Slam is going to be, so let’s just be here, take the 500 points and then we will go to the Grand Slam, play the matches and now you’re match-ready and will be fine.
“So she did that and like I said all her titles recently have come the weeks before Slams, because she is there. She’s there a bit more mentally than everyone else.
“Adelaide [this year before Australian Open], I actually thought she played unbelievably. It was her best level that I’ve seen from her. Even higher than AO.
“The matches she played in Adelaide, she was hitting the ball unbelievably. And the nervy moments of the second set of the Rybakina match, there was none of that.
“She just blitzed everybody there. The match with [Jessica] Pegula was tighter but it never felt like she would lose that match, the way that she was playing.”
Madison Keys wins 10th WTA Tour title at Australian Open
Keys simply didn’t stop picking up the wins in Adelaide and Melbourne, having been unseeded in the former and seeded 19th in the latter.
Top 10 seeds Jelena Ostapenko and Daria Kasatkina were among her victims in Adelaide, before a superb final win was secured over top seed and compatriot Pegula.
READ MORE: Two-time Grand Slam champion announces comeback to tennis after 15-month break
And Keys managed to continue that momentum into the first Grand Slam of 2025, where she beat another American in Danielle Collins en route to the trophy.
It has been a remarkable turnaround for Keys at 29, with Fratangelo also deserving of plenty of praise for his efforts with the player both on and off the court.
She is now into double figures for WTA Tour-level titles, and currently occupies her career-high ranking as more success is eyed in the coming months.
Just one loss has been suffered so far this season from her 15 matches, with Keys losing to Clara Tauson in the ASB Classic quarter-finals.
Appropriately, Tauson went on to lift the trophy at that event, beating four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka in the final.
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