Marketa Vondrousova is the tattoo and trainer-obsessed Wimbledon finalist

A quick look through Vondrousova’s pedigree should have revealed the characteristics of a future champion.

Daughter of Jindřiška Anderlová, once a prominent volleyball player for Slavia Prague, and granddaughter of František Frk, the 1935 Czech national pentathlon champion, it was no surprise that a young Marketa was gifted in every sport.

“She started playing floorball and immediately started scoring goals for the school,” explains her father David tenisovysvet.cz.

“She was also very good at running or playing soccer with the boys. When we put a ping pong bat in her hand, she immediately started winning.’

Father David and mother Jindřiška divorced when she was three, but it was decided early on that they would put aside any differences to advance her sporting prospects.

‘From the start it was my vision that Markéta could play sports at the highest level. It was clear she could handle it,” added her father, who was the driving force behind her starting tennis when she was four.

“I had a good relationship with tennis. I never played it competitively, but I had a sporting grandfather and he started playing it recreationally with me at the age of 12,” he explains.

‘He got a wooden racket out of the closet and we used to play all through the holidays. I always had bloody hands from the calluses, but I had a lot of fun.’

Vondrousova grew up in Sokolov, a small town in the Czech Republic, a two-hour drive from Prague and close to the border with Germany.

She quickly became a talking point in junior tournaments, and the constant traveling soon wore off as a teen, when she took the plunge at age 14 to move to Prague on her own to train.

Clay was – and is – her favorite surface, it’s where she grew up playing and so when she reached the French Open final in 2019, she felt the natural path to prosperity.

Grass, a surface she previously described as “impossible” to excel on, was not part of the script.

Remarkably, even with her six wins and run to the Wimbledon final, she still has a losing record on grass, with 10 wins and 11 losses. She can even the field with her first-ever Grand Slam on Saturday.

Vondrousova, a former junior world No. 1, is a quiet and calm character by her own admission. They are two traits that have served her well and youth coaches all noted that her poise on the court set her apart from peers.

But while she’s fine with being understated, it was the individual nature of tennis that appealed to her. It was one of the reasons why she liked to turn her back on football.

Although she has an introverted side, Vondrousova expresses herself in other ways and quickly found her footing in Prague.

At the age of 16, while juggling school, which was specially designed to help her continue playing tennis, she met her current husband, IT manager Stepan Simek.

She would also begin her love affair with tattoos, which has led her to treat her body like a scribble board ever since, using different designs both with a tattoo gun and also through stick-and-poke.

“I actually got the first one when I was 16 for my birthday and I don’t know, I felt like I wanted more!” Vondrousova told the BBC.

“It’s art to me and I have 3 or 4 (tattoo artists) I go to in Prague.”

As for her many designs – she’s largely selective in how much she reveals publicly.

One, visible on her right triceps, reads “no rain, no flowers.”

It feels fitting for a player who missed this tournament injured 12 months ago and watched like the rest of us.

In a figurative sense, tattoo means to go through adversity to make way for the good times later on. For Vondrousova, a losing finalist in the French Open and the Olympics, she’s a perfect fit.

Vondrousova, who is coached by Jan Mertl, has previously stood on this podium at the French Open and knows the importance of taking the pressure off.

Whether it’s her obsession with buying sneakers – in 2019 she told Mail Sport she owned more than 200 pairs – or sharing stories about her pets, Brownie the pug and Frankie the Sphynx cat, it all helps to exceed expectations.

Brownie lives with her grandmother, but Frankie, the newest addition to the family, is in Prague with her husband. It’s what has kept him from coming to SW19 so far.

‘He is [Simek] come tomorrow with my sister. We texted the cat sitter to come to our house,” she said after beating Elina Svitolina in the semifinals.

Simek rarely travels on tour with his wife, instead staying home with the cat and out of the limelight.

But his role is very present, not least the pep talk he managed to generate to help her cross the line in a gripping quarter-final with Jessica Pegula.

The 2019 French Open finalist was 3-1 down in the deciding set against the American when play was interrupted for more than 20 minutes to allow the roof of Court One to close due to predicted rain.

Vondrousova spoke on the phone to husband Simek during the unexpected stoppage and, once play resumed, fought back from 4-1 and a break point down to continue her best run at the All England Club with a gripping 6- 4, 2-6, 6-4 success.

“I actually haven’t seen my coach,” she said of the weather delay. “I was alone in the waiting room.

‘I chatted with my husband. We spoke on the phone. He just said ‘try to fight, you’re playing well, you’re playing a great game’.

‘That was it. I think the break really helped. It was good.

She had break points for 5-1. You’re not in a good mood. I just kept believing in myself.

“After the match point I couldn’t believe it. I just couldn’t hold back the tears.’

Now for all the genes and rich family history, it’s Vondrousova, the first unseeded Wimbledon finalist in the Open Era, against Ons Jabeur. At No. 42 in the world, Vondrousova is also the second lowest-ranked player to reach the Wimbledon final since the introduction of the WTA rankings, with only Serena Williams in 2018 (No. 181) ranked lower.

Winner takes home £2.35 million… not bad if you want a few more sneakers for the collection.