US Open final: For Jabeur, the queen of drop shot, a shot at Grand Slam title Ons more

“I have manifested it (Grand slam triumph). I know I am going to win the title I always wanted in my life.”
It’s the French Open Ons Jabeur is really after, but after a shock first-round defeat there this year, she got close to her dream reaching the Wimbledon final, and now gets a chance at the US Open.
The Queen of Drop Shot, as she is known in the tennis circuit, was the first African woman to reach a Grand Slam final when she did it at Wimbledon but the win proved elusive. Now, against the world No. 1 Iga Swiatek, can she pull it off in New York?
“I believe in energy. I believe in the spiritual world. I believe that everything that happens you should manifest it. I believe you should ask the universe for everything. I believe this is how it was meant to be. I believe if something bad happens, something good will happen. I have big faith in God and in myself because I know I am capable,” Jabeur says in the former tennis player Rennae Stubbs’ eponymously titled podcast.

A moment she’s been waiting for! @Ons_Jabeur finally had a chance to meet her idol @andyroddick at the #USOpen. pic.twitter.com/aJX4vabxG5
— US Open Tennis (@usopen) September 7, 2022
She didn’t always ask the universe for everything. Her performance psycholog Melanie Maillard from France, who at times accompanies Jabeur to tournaments, told The National about Jabeur’s mindset a few years ago.
“She had to face some fears she had and one of those fears was, ‘Who am I to put myself on the scene and is it useful for the people?’ … She can love a lot of people, she wants to share a lot, she had to love herself too.”
Jabeur spent her early childhood in the coastal town of Ksar Hellal in Tunisia, and started playing tennis at 3, as her mother used to drag her along. Her athleticism and ball sense attracted coaches from football to handball but she chose tennis, moving to a sports school in Tunis, Tunisia’s capital, at 13.
Perhaps some of her reticence in the professional world came because of where she came from: A small town Arab woman. “We simply could not imagine that she would be able to match up with rivals from countries which, contrary to Tunisia, invest in sport,” her uncle Mohammad once told Middle East Eye. “Her parents have done everything possible to support her, and sometimes spent more money than they had. Yet we did not expect her to go far.”

We brought in a Rubik’s cube art to do a portrait of @Ons_Jabeur.
The result was amazing 🤩 pic.twitter.com/TZKM6H1uC8
— US Open Tennis (@usopen) September 8, 2022
But she slowly started to make waves. She won the French Open junior title at 16 and has trained in France and Belgium but her base is Tunisia, where she lives with her husband, Karim Kamoun, who is also her fitness trainer.
Initially when he joined her entourage, there were some stressful moments as she had to adjust to her husband pushing her hard as her fitness trainer. “At the beginning, yes, but now we are good. We understand each other a lot, and I started to play my best tennis,” she says in that podcast. “It’s a lonely life, traveling, so to be able for him to travel with me and be my fitness coach, is very good.”
Her early years as an adult professional didn’t see as much progress as some might have anticipated after her success as a teenager. In the podcast, she talks about how some of her coaches would say play like Maria Sharapova and such, taking her away from the soul of her game. Slowly she started to weed off from such advice.
“She believes more in herself. She used to be not so self confident,” says her psycholog Maillard to The National. “She was a bit shy, now she wants to share so many things. She’s what I call a heart-open player. And when she understood that, she said, ‘Okay I go now, I don’t have to be so shy’ … So that was a big task, and to make her love working too. And to len to all what she had to say. She didn’t know that she could say all that she had to say.”

Jabeur’s first name means ‘removal of fear’ and to ‘provide a comforting presence for another’ in Arabic. Once she understood that a bit of self-love too is good for her, she began to flower as a person. She is understandably huge in the Arabic world, with fans carrying Tunisian flags to her games. At times, she would tell her opponents shyly ahead of the games that there might be some noise in the stands. Slowly she began to warm up, and now speaks passionately about her love for her country and region.
“I especially hope Tunisian and Arab girls can be inspired my story and my success. I am also getting inspired them,” she says. “I hope I can have a positive influence for more and more generations. That would be the best thing I can do.”
The Queen of drop shot
She already has the best thing in women’s tennis: the wicked drop shot. Hit YouTube for evidence: “9 mins of drop-god” and such should be enough to convince. It’s a cute coincidence that two finals this US Open, Alcaraz and Jabeur, are known for this shot. She drops them dead with both the backhand and the forehand. Opponents who know her well at time start running from baseline in anticipation, she laughs in Stubbs’ podcast.
At times when she serves, she can deploy the shot as soon as the return comes. Once, against Venus Williams, she dropped off her return of serve itself, stunning the American. At times, she will make them sweat while waiting. Over the years, her game sense has helped her time it more effectively, depending on her opponent.

“She hates playing at one pace. She’s always trying to create a spectacle switching up the game with shots that surprise her opponents, especially with drop shots,” said her childhood coach Nabil Mlika. “She’s really the queen of the drop shot.”
Tracy Austin, former player and an admirer of her drop shot, has raved: “You’re never sure what’s coming. You never get the same ball twice from her. “She’s an outlier—she’s special.”
When she was young, she was called Federer of Tunisia; such is her graceful movements and positional play. These days she is called the Miner of Happiness, for spreading hope and joy in Arab girls.
“She had to make sense of this responsibility and to face it,” her psycholog Maillard said. “She took it that way and I think that was in her all along, she just had to accept it and to allow it to come out. She is someone very strong and she knows what she has to do and why and each time she goes on court she has to remember that this is bigger than her but that she can take this responsibility.”
When Renne Stubbs asks her about her future goal, Jabeur talks about a tennis academy she plans in her Tunisia. And she adds, “this is not for money”. She wants more kids to emerge from North Africa; so that she isn’t the only top-level tennis player. “That would be a good life. That is my ultimate goal.”
But first a small matter of manifesting a Grand Slam title remains. Will the US Open be her first one?