MELBOURNE, Australia \u2014 A statement of confidence as much as style, Naomi Osaka walked onto one of the biggest stages in tennis wearing a wide-brim hat, a veil and holding a white parasol in a bold opening act at the Australian Open.<\/p>\n
Aware that such an iconic walk-on could backfire if she lost her first-round match, Osaka did everything she needed Tuesday to bring down the curtain on Day 3 at Rod Laver Arena with a 6-3, 3-6, 6-4 victory over Antonia Ruzic.<\/p>\n
The hat and umbrella were adorned with symbolic butterflies, a nod to one of the memorable moments of Osaka’s last title run at Melbourne Park in 2021 rather than a reflection of the usual first-round jitters at a major tournament.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I was playing today, I just told myself, like, \u2018Keep your head on the path. If she beats you, then that\u2019s unfortunate. But, hey, at least you\u2019re trending,'” on social media, she said.<\/p>\n
Osaka has won four Grand Slam singles titles, including two at the U.S. Open and two in Australia in 2019 and 2021.<\/p>\n
She next plays Sorana Cirstea, who beat Eva Lys 3-6, 6-4, 6-3. After reaching the\u00a0U.S. Open semifinals last year\u00a0\u2014 her best result at a Grand Slam event in four years \u2014 Osaka is growing in confidence.<\/p>\n
Born in Japan but growing up in America, Osaka was inspired by Venus and Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova, the tennis stars she described as the \u201cG.O.A.T’s of style.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it all comes down to personality, too,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The dress she wore in her first-round match, in shades of blue and green, was also a tribute to her daughter, Shai, and her fascination with jellyfish.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, the inspiration was obviously the jellyfish, then butterflies, which kind of ties back to the butterfly moment I had here a long time ago, in 2021,\u201d Osaka said, recalling the images of one landing on her during a third-round match.<\/p>\n
It took months of planning. And it all tied in with the remodelled player tunnel at Rod Laver Arena that reflects Australian themes such as beaches and the coast.<\/p>\n
\u201cHonestly it came together quite beautifully because I didn\u2019t know what to expect when I arrived here,\u201d Osaka said. “Then it just felt like everywhere I looked the theme was water. Obviously the walkout was like you see oceans and waves. I thought that it was really beautiful. Really amazing coincidence.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MELBOURNE, Australia \u2014 A statement of confidence as much as style, Naomi Osaka walked onto one of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":422056,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":["post-422055","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422055","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=422055"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422055\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/422056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=422055"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=422055"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=422055"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}