Nothing like this has happened since 1988. Without two years, two pairs from the same country have not provided the junior doubles final for almost four decades.
The Kovačkov sisters already excelled at last year’s junior US Open, which they won. This time they made their way into the battle for the title in Melbourne, and the roles of their opponents were taken by their well-known peers from Sparta and Štvanice, Tereza Heřmanová and Denisa Žoldáková.
“But we weren’t too nervous about playing against the Czechs. We’re friends. I had fun with the girls even three minutes before the match. It was cool,” revealed Jana Kovačková in an interview for Tenisový svět.
In the end, it was she who sent a successful throw over the line and who converted the match point and achieved an unequivocal victory 6:1 and 6:3.
Anyone expecting a wild sisterly celebration would be wrong. Just a fleeting smile, a light hug and then just a greeting at the net.
“It’s not as big for us as when we won the first time,” admitted Jana Kovačková.
After the ceremony, they didn’t even hide that they went to Australia with slightly different goals. After all, Alena played the role of number one and Jan played the role of number two in the singles Grand Slam tournament. Only while the first ended in the round of 16, the second even in the second round.
“We definitely wanted to win mainly in the singles, but unfortunately I didn’t do very well in the singles and I can’t fix that. I performed poorly here. I’m certainly happy that we won the doubles, but I’m leaving sad about my performance in the singles,” said Jana Kovačková, who was only fifteen years old.
Her older sister, who was two years older, wasn’t much happier.
“I’m also very sorry for that single. It’s a shame that I didn’t make it to the third round and that I couldn’t turn the match around. We ran into opponents who play very fast, it wasn’t easy to chase them in the singles,” added Alena Kovačková.
The older of the sisters would like to play mainly senior tournaments in the future, so that she can slowly start looking around in adult tennis.
Mom Eva, who also plays the role of coach for the girls, is so far satisfied with her daughters’ tennis development.
“I see it a bit like a slow rise. It’s not some ups and downs. Maybe Jája was a little used to having won somewhere a year earlier, but towards the end of the year she wasn’t as successful as she probably would have liked, however, I really feel that the performance of both of them is slowly increasing,” she declared.
As a parent, he is well aware that both girls are currently at a difficult age, when puberty also speaks for their behavior on and off the court.
“Both girls are definitely going through puberty, although each a little differently. Alenka may have had it a little later, she was more fragile, very vulnerable. Jaja, on the other hand, is very defiant, it’s probably a classic puberty for her,” revealed Eva Kovačková.
Even she already sees her daughters as more mature in terms of tennis, even though they are both juniors in age.
“The younger Jája even thought that she wouldn’t even come here anymore. But she is fifteen and according to all sponsorship contracts and agreements, she should play the junior grand slams. On the contrary, Alenka wanted to try. She wanted to prove to herself that she could still do well in singles here. She wanted to go with us, even though we all convinced her not to go,” added the mother of the tennis sisters.
Although both sisters return from Australia with mixed feelings, they have definitely made their mark in Czech tennis history. They became the first Czech pair since 2015 to win junior doubles at the Australian Open. Last time it was done by Markéta Vondroušová and Miriam Kolodziejová.
