MIAMI, FL, USA – In the wake of Angelique Kerber’s most unexpected of triumphs at this January’s Australian Open, the tennis world was intrigued to find out what was next for its newest major champion.

Would she quickly be sucked back into the pack or at 28 was she now ready to use this breakthrough as a springboard to elevate her game to the next level?

In her first outing as a Grand Slam champion, Kerber was brought back to earth with a bump, slumping to a shock defeat at the hands of Zheng Saisai at the Qatar Total Open. By her own admission, Kerber struggled to deal with the occasion, her metronomic groundstrokes breaking down under the strain.

Worse was to follow at the BNP Paribas Open, the German crashing out at the first hurdle to another unheralded opponent, Denisa Allertova. These sobering experiences provided a wake-up call, and she redoubled her efforts to rediscover the winning formula in Miami.

“Actually, it was not so easy because I had so many things to do, and also after Indian Wells where I was still not feeling 100%. Had like few days before coming here to focus again on my practice, on my work on court, and to make sure I play good matches here.”

A routine victory over Barbora Strycova was followed by more testing assignments against Kiki Bertens and Timea Babos, which she came through before playing her best tennis of the week to stymie the big-hitting Madison Keys in the quarterfinals.

“I had tough matches in the early rounds. Today I was feeling much better, and I think that the matches here give me again more confidence for the next tournaments and that my game’s still in a good way.”

And she will need to be firing on all cylinders against her next opponent, the WTA’s form player, Victoria Azarenka. “She had a great start of the year, of course. She is on fire I think right now. I will just trying to play my game go out and try to beat her. I mean, we played two times already this year and that’s the third time.

“I will try to enjoy it. I know that I must play really my best tennis to beat her because she won Indian Wells; she’s here now in the semis.”

The two are well acquainted with one another, having met twice at the start of year in Australia; Azarenka took the spoils on the first occasion in a one-sided Brisbane final before Kerber gained revenge en route to her Melbourne triumph.

This was Kerber’s first victory over Azarenka in seven attempts and she is planning to adopt a similarly positive approach for the rematch. “I went out there and trying to be really aggressive from the first point, trying to really believe in myself, because until this time I never won the match against her. It was 0-6; now it’s 1-6,” Kerber said.

“I will try to go out there again like in Australia and try to believe in my game and myself and, yeah, trying to challenge her. It will be not easy. It will be tough match. But this is for what I am practicing, for the big matches out there, to really show what, yeah, we can do and playing the best tennis.”