Wimbledon 2025: Amanda Anisimova ‘froze’ in heavy defeat by Iga Swiatek

Getting over a demoralising defeat can take time for some players.

Germany’s Alexander Zverev talked about “feeling lost” after suffering a third successive Grand Slam final defeat.

But others – like Jannik Sinner, who reached the Wimbledon men’s final 35 days after losing a classic French Open final – have been able to quickly bounce back.

Anisimova, who took a break from the sport two years ago to protect her mental health, might look to what she learned during a stint studying business with psychology at university.

She hopes a quote by American author Marianne Williamson – about how pain can “burn you up and destroy you or burn you up and redeem you” – will help the process.

And she will also take inspiration from the quote from Rudyard Kipling’s poem If – ‘If you can meet with triumph and disaster, and treat those two impostors just the same’ – that is above the entrance to Centre Court.

“I think it’s really helpful that that quote is up there and it’s definitely going to stay on my mind the next few days,” she told BBC Sport.

Former world number one Tracy Austin said she hoped Anisimova would recover well because of the work she has done on her mentality.

“Having her people around – her mum, sister and nephew are in town – will help,” Austin told BBC Sport.

“She might be able to quickly realise that it is her first major final against a former world number one who was 5-0 in major finals.

“This was a lot for Amanda to take on. Wimbledon adds another 25-30% of pressure because it is Wimbledon.”

Anisimova said she had never lost a match 6-0 6-0.

“For it to be in my first Grand Slam final was definitely very hard to digest, but I’ve been in difficult situations before in my career, and I feel like I’ve learned so much from those moments,” she told BBC Sport.

“The only thing I told myself was to keep my head high and to keep fighting because I didn’t want to let myself down at any moment.”