American doubles star recalls of the pain: 'I remember kinda lying on my side counting blades of grass just to distract myself.'
BACK at Wimbledon for the first time since her horror injury last year, Bethanie Mattek-Sands can't hold back the tears.
The American star, winner of seven grand slams in doubles and mixed doubles, has invited SunSport to join her as she re-visited Court 17- and exorcising the demons sees her overcome with emotion.
On that very spot a year ago Mattek-Sands, now 33, was left in a heap needing oxygen at the All England Club after dislocating knee and rupturing the patella tendon; an injury so severe many thought she would have to retire.
Memories of the searing pain come flooding back, but it is a journey that needed to be made as Mattek-Sands admitted. She said: "I was going to come back, whether we did it with you guys or on my own.
"Come back and lay in the same area I went down, back to the court and almost let it go a little bit.
"I’m not really a big person for reminiscing, I don’t like to look back into the past too much. So this moment is a little different for me, because I’m kinda taking a second to look back.
“I have done it in my mind, obviously, visualising in my rehab – that was part of the process. As much it was a physical comeback, it was mentally trusting my body again, trusting my knee again.
“Being here, I can just let it go. I feel a little lighter now after that moment out there.
"But that was, yeah, wow. That was quite a day."
Mattek-Sands had gone into the 2017 Championships aiming to make a good run in the Ladies Singles, but it was in the Ladies Doubles where she was really set on doing the business.
Together with partner Lucie Safarova, the pair needed victory at Wimbledon to complete the Grand Slam of holding all four major titles at the same time. The pinnacle of a career which had also brought 2016 Olympic mixed-doubles gold was within touching distance.
In a second, the American’s hopes were gone.
Making a dash to the net in the first game of the third set of her second round singles match against Sirana Cirstea, the right kneecap ruptured and twisted around almost 90 degrees.
For 17 minutes she lay flat out, being comforted by her husband, Justin, as she was injected with morphine and given oxygen in an effort to dull the pain before the stretcher wheeled her into the back of an ambulance.
Amidst all that, some memories are etched on her mind.
She said: “I’m not going to lie, I feel like I spent a lot of time lying here. It seemed like an eternity that I was down there on the ground.
“I remember at one point, it was excruciating; I remember kinda lying on my side counting blades of grass just to distract myself.
“There was so much going on around me, I just remember trying to focus on the grass. How many individual blades of grass there were.
“I think it was when I was on the ground I asked Justin if I was going to walk off the court, and he just said ‘nah, you’re not going to be walking off’.
“I remember asking him, when he first came on, I asked him ‘Justin, how f*****g bad is it? How f*****g bad is this?’
“And he goes ‘babe, just don’t look at it’. I was like ‘no, f** you I looked at it already – tell me, honestly, how bad is it?’ and he just goes ‘hmmm, it’s not good!’.
“I remember that conversation so vividly. My adrenalin was going, they were giving me morphine on the court and it wasn’t working. That was a vivid conversation. But I did look at my knee in the beginning.
“I felt something was wrong and then when I looked at it it just looked really wrong. I didn’t know if it was broken, it had just turned. I didn’t look at it after that first glance.”
Mattek-Sands underwent surgery immediately, then flew back home to Arizona where she embarked on a gruelling rehabilitation programme. Though others floated the idea of retirement, the thought didn’t even enter her mind.
And always at the forefront of her thinking, inspiring her through some of the dark days, was the drive and absolute determination to be back at Wimbledon this year fighting for the only slam doubles title that eludes her.
She has made it, and will partner Safarova as part of “Team Bucie” as an unseeded pairing who the rest of the field will want to avoid. Yet tournament bosses have not seen fit to grant a wildcard for the singles, a decision that leaves Mattek-Sands visibly upset.
She said: “Wimbledon was huge for me. From the beginning it was one of the biggest goals for me to come.
“It was one of those things I set out there to come back for, it was a big driving force for me to come back as quick as I did, to be ready to compete here.
“Not to just say I made it, barely, I wanted to come here ready to compete and wanting to win – where I was at last year.
“I didn’t want to just come back to say ‘hey, I stepped on the grass again’. I wanted to be ready to win matches and get back to where I was last year.
“One year later, Team Bucie is making a comeback. I think it’s fitting that it’s at Wimbledon.
“Unfortunately I didn’t receive a wild card this year in the singles which was, I was…” Suddenly, the emotion return, a mixture of anger and disappointment.
“I thought I had a pretty good case. I felt I was a pretty good contender for this year, and you know, it was really a tough one to swallow. That took the wind out of my sails for a brief moment.
“That was one of my goals, and it almost made me debate if I wanted to come back and play this year.
“I really thought I was going to be in, just on my story and everything that transpired last year, I thought I had a good chance of getting one.
“But I had talked with Lucie, the more I thought about it, the more excited I got, you know that I can play doubles back on the court with one of my best friends.
“I am a competitor, I like game days. As much as I like training and fitness and all of this, I really love match days. So I am here to win.
“There are a lot of good players. I have been watching all the girls play, there have been a lot of great doubles matches and I’m sure they are ready for me – but I am ready to go.
“It’s going to be fun – I’m ready to get this thing started.”
