The story of Harri Heliövaara and Anna Danilina is like a fairy tale, writes Urheilu’s Sakari Lund.
Sakari Lund Sports journalist
Harri Heliövaara walked into the competition office at the start of the tennis US Open and put his name on the list looking for a pair for mixed doubles.
Heliövaara had come to New York to seek success in doubles with his regular partner by Lloyd Glasspool with. However, this time he also wanted to participate in the mixed doubles game. It is practically only played in Grand Slam tournaments, so there are hardly any regular pairs.
The same thing was also the case Anna Danilina. Heliövaara and Danilina representing Kazakhstan hadn’t even met each other before, but they decided to play together.
The career of both in their respective doubles games ended in the second round and in great disappointment. Danilina was a couple, by the way Heather Watsonwho won Henri Kontinen with the Wimbledon mixed doubles championship in 2016. After the eliminations, the duo was then allowed to focus fully on mixed doubles.
The game started to flow, the chemistry worked well and one after another the Finnish-Kazakh duo was better. Danilina turned out to be a good match. His serves are strong, albeit uncertain at times. The returns are aggressive and the online game is also good, although sometimes unorthodox looking.
In the end, the couple’s story was like a fairy tale. It led to the perfect climax, up to the Grand Slam championship. You could think that Heliövaara and Danilina will continue to play together.
The mixed doubles game is undeniably the lowest in the ranking of tennis. Heliövaarak would certainly have preferred success in his bread sport in the men’s doubles. However, a Grand Slam win is always a Grand Slam win and everyone wants it.
Heliövaara and Danilina’s fighting look was great throughout the tournament. The success will certainly give an additional boost to the games with Glasspool, which have been going slowly lately.
Heliövaara now goes to Split, Croatia. From Tuesday, the Davis Cup final tournament will be played there, where Finland will participate for the first time in history. So the great moments in Finnish tennis continue.