Maria Sharapova has admitted she is back in love with tennis having finally put her persistent shoulder injury behind her.
Maria Sharapova has admitted she is back in love with tennis having finally put her persistent shoulder injury behind her.
The Russian stormed into the second round of the ladies' singles at Wimbledon with a 6-0, 6-1 demolition of compatriot Anastasia Pivovarova here on Tuesday.
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Sharapova spent two years dogged by trouble after winning the Australian Open in 2008 and has flopped at the last two Wimbledons.
In 2008 she went out in the second round weeks before having surgery and her return in 2009, another second round defeat, came shortly after a nine-month absence from the game.
But following her routine beating of Pivovarova she insisted she was enjoying the game as much as she was before injury struck.
"My joy in the game is pretty much up there with what it was before I got injured," the 16th seed said.
"Maybe even more so because it was taken away from me for such a long period of time that you realise how blessed you are when you are actually on court and are able to hit a tennis ball for an hour a day and be good at what you do.
"It is a good feeling when you go to your job and know you are pretty darn good at what you do and you can be better.
"I believed I would be back. I assumed and I had a lot of belief in myself and a tremendous amount of support from the people around me. But you never know until things happen."
The 23-year-old is also wary of the young challengers coming through looking to make the same impact as she did when she stunned the tennis world by winning Wimbledon at the age of 17.
"I know there's always going to be younger girls coming up with different types of games," the Siberian said.
"You have to be ready for that. You have seen that in the last year there are many different types of players, and some younger girls that broke through that did well.
"It is a little bit different than it was a few years ago - you have to be ready from the first round to play against some really tough opponents."
The 2004 Wimbledon champion, and former world number one, wrapped up the match in under an hour against an opponent ranked 110 places below her at 127.
Sharapova was a class above Pivovarova who qualified for the tournament as lucky loser.
The Russian broke Pivovarova in the first game of the match and served so well she did not have to face a single break point.
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