Tennis News

MELBOURNE, Australia – The first Grand Slam of the year is almost here as the Australian Open kicks off in Melbourne on Monday. The doubles draw is out, and Bethanie Mattek-Sands reunites with Lucie Safarova in hopes of defending her No.1 ranking against a trio of challengers.

But Serena Williams and Venus Williams threaten to blow the draw right open as they will take the court together to compete in doubles for the first time since the Olympic Games.

Click here to see the full singles and doubles draws.

POTENTIAL QUARTERFINALS:

[1] Caroline Garcia / Kristina Mladenovic vs [5] Martina Hingis / CoCo Vandeweghe
[3] Ekaterina Makarova / Elena Vesnina vs [7] Julia Goerges / Karolina Pliskova
[8] Vania King / Yaroslava Shvedova vs [4] Sania Mirza / Barbora Strycova
[6] Chan Yung-Jan / Chan Hao-Ching vs [2] Bethanie Mattek-Sands / Lucie Safarova

STORYLINES TO WATCH:

Garcia & Mladenovic are making their 2017 debut: The No.1 seeds Caroline Garcia and Kristina Mladenovic are set to play together for the first time in 2017 at the Australian Open. The reigning French Open champions have always been adamant that their focus was on the singles competition, and at times seemed almost baffled by their continued doubles success. But the pair are back together for the first major of the year, and even have a shot at becoming co-No.1s.

“As we repeated well enough, we are singles players, our priority is singles,” Mladenovic told WTA Insider at the WTA Finals, where they reached the semifinals. “[But] even if we are singles players, just to be able to say that you’ve been No.1 in the world in doubles, is such a pride.”

The French team will play Belinda Bencic and Ana Konjuh in the first round.

The No.1 ranking could change hands again: Newly-crowned World No.1 Bethanie Mattek-Sands has barely had time to savor her rise to the top before her ranking is back into play. Garcia, Mladenovic and Elena Vesnina all have a shot at becoming World No.1 by the end of the fortnight.

Of course, should Mattek-Sands and Safarova take home the Australian Open title, the ranking will stay with the American. But that’s easier said than done….

Serena Williams and Venus Williams join forces: Looming in Mattek-Sands and Safarova’s side of the draw are Serena Williams and Venus Williams. The veteran doubles team is joining forces for the first time since the Olympic tennis event, where they lost in the first round to Czech duo Safarova & Strycova. Between the two of them they’ve amassed 14 Grand Slam titles in doubles, making them a veritable threat in any major tournament.

Seeded No.15, they could potentially book a third-round clash with Mattek-Sands/Safarova, throwing a wrench in the works for Mattek-Sands’ defense of her newly-gained top ranking.

– Photos courtesy of Getty Images

BRISBANE, Australia – No matter who wins Saturday’s final at the Brisbane International, one player will walk away with a drought-busting win. No.22 Victoria Azarenka is in her first final since Doha and aiming for her first title since Cincinnati in 2013, nearly two and a half years ago. Looking to stop her is No.10 Angelique Kerber, who will try and snag her first win in six tries over Azarenka.

The first week of the year began with much hand-wringing over the withdrawals and retirements of the Top 3 seeds in the tournament, with defending champion Maria Sharapova, World No.2 Simona Halep, and No.3 Garbiñe Muguruza exiting the tournament under a cloud of injury. It will end with a rematch of the best women’s match of 2015, when Azarenka got the better of Kerber in the third round of the US Open, winning 7-5, 2-6, 6-4 in a grueling match.

“We always bring the best out of each other, I think,” Azarenka said. “I mean, I hope we do. It was a pretty amazing match, so I hope we can put on a good show. I think the final deserves that.”

Azarenka has been in blistering form all week. She has dropped just 13 games in four matches, posting two bagel sets along the way. Her run in Brisbane most assuredly puts her on the shortlist of favorites at the Australian Open – she is, after all, a two-time champion in Melbourne – but Azarenka doesn’t want to get ahead of herself.

“I’m feeling pretty good right now,” she said. “I’m not saying anything besides that. It’s irrelevant. Tomorrow is a match. I’m looking forward to that. I never jump ahead. It can seem so close, yet so far. Done those mistakes before, and I’ll stick to being present.”

Kerber has looked just as sharp this week. Aside from dropping the first set of her tournament to Camila Giorgi, Kerber has been untouchable, notching wins over Giorgi, Madison Brengle, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, and Carla Suárez Navarro. Most notably Kerber has unveiled a more aggressive gamestyle. A change of strings during the off-season – she now uses a Yonex hybrid and natural gut – has given her more pop on her groundstrokes.

“I was working a lot in the last few weeks on this, so I’m trying to transform it to the matches,” Kerber said of her newfound aggression. “It works good right now. Of course I must take the decision and just go for it and not hope that the other one will miss. I will try to make the points by myself.”

Looking towards Saturday’s final, the big focus point will be Kerber’s serve. Azarenka is one of, if not *the* best returner in the game when she’s at her best. Much of her 5-0 record against the German is a result of her ability to dominate Kerber’s second serve. Kerber hopes her off-season work on her serve will pay off now.

“I worked a lot in my off-season on my serve, and I’m feeling that the serve is also a little bit faster,” she said. “Also I’m trying to go for it with my second serve, not only pushing the ball. Of course that needs time. I think I’m on the good way. I’m feeling better on my serve.”

So will we see another three-set epic on Saturday? Kerber’s 2015 was defined by her participation in the year’s best matches. Earlier in the week Kerber’s compatriot and doubles partner Andrea Petkovic – the two are into the doubles final against Martina Hingis and Sania Mirza – was asked why her friend always finds herself embroiled in dramatic matches against the game’s best.

“I think one part of her game style is that she plays fast but just not too fast to make the other girls play well,” Petkovic said. “She’s too good for the lower-ranked players, but for the top players I think she [hits] exactly the pace they need to play really well.

“But Angie is somebody, when she gets challenged, she gets the best out of her as well. So I think these two things coming together just make for Hollywood, popcorn, great movie nights.”

Come back on Saturday as WTA Insider live blogs the final from Brisbane. The final begins at 7:30pm local time, 9:30am GMT.

MELBOURNE, Australia – The bottom half of the draw is back in action led by Serena Williams, Agnieszka Radwanska and Karolina Pliskova. We preview all the day’s matchups right here at wtatennis.com.

Thursday, Second Round

[2] Serena Williams (USA #2) vs Lucie Safarova (CZE #61)
Head-to-head: Serena leads 9-0
Key Stat: Serena is contesting the Australian Open for the 17^th time – the joint-most along with sister Venus Williams

Lucie Safarova saved an astonishing nine match points in her opening match against Yanina Wickmayer, a two-hour three-set marathon. But unfortunately for the Czech, it doesn’t get any easier in the second round, where she’ll need all that grit against six-time champion Serena Williams.

The last time these two met was at the final of the French Open back in 2015, with this early encounter a testament to the pair’s diverging career paths. Serena is now seeking her record breaking 23^rd Grand Slam title in Melbourne and Safarova, a former World No.5, plummeting out of the Top 50 after struggling with injury and illness.

“I didn’t come here to lose in the first round, or the second round, or at all,” Serena told press earlier in the tournament. “I’m just here to play and to win obviously, but just to play.”

 [3] Agnieszka Radwanska (POL #3) vs Mirjana Lucic-Baroni (CRO #79)
Head-to-head: Radwanska leads 2-0
Key Stat: Lucic-Baroni is 3-14 against Top 5 players

The last time Mirjana Lucic-Baroni won a match in Melbourne it was 1998 – Martina Hingis was the WTA World No.1 and Serena Williams hadn’t yet won her first career title.

But there’s not much time for the former Wimbledon semifinal to revel in the three-set comeback win over Wang Qiang, because up next is World No.3 Agnieszka Radwanska.

A two-time semifinalist here, Radwanska faced a battle in her opener against Tsvetana Pironkova but saved her best for last to move into the second round for the ninth time in her career. The Pole is hoping to continue that run and bring her signature mix of skill and creativity to the second week of this Slam.

“I really feel good on this center court,” Radwanska said in press. “I like to play here, I like Australia. I’ve been always playing good tennis here, two semis.

“Of course, that’s always very close till the end. Hopefully I can do one step forward and play seven matches here.”

[5] Karolina Pliskova (CZE #5) vs [Q] Anna Blinkova (RUS #189)
Head-to-head: First meeting
Key Stat: This is Blinkova’s first ever match against a Top 10 opponent

No.5 seed Karolina Pliskova barely broke a sweat in her Melbourne opener, making quick work of Spain’s Sara Sorribes Tormo and needing just one hour and dropping two games en route to the second round.

But she still wasn’t completely satisfied after the 6-2, 6-0 victory:

“I think there are more things which I want to improve. First round, it’s always tricky, and I didn’t feel that good in the first set there.

“I was a little bit nervous in the beginning, made a lot of mistakes on my forehand, especially no first serves. So this I want to improve high percentage of the first serve, definitely.”

It’s a scary prospect that the WTA’s undisputed ace leader still wants to improve her serve. But that’s what Russian qualifier Anna Blinkova will be up against in her first ever match against a Top 10 opponent.

Blinkova might be slightly out of her depths against big-hitting Pliskova, but don’t count her out just yet: she started her Australian Open main draw campaign with a statement win over the No.32-ranked Monica Niculescu.  

Around the grounds…

No.6 seed Dominika Cibulkova continues her quest for a maiden Slam in her second round clash against Taipei’s Hsieh Su-Wei. Cibulkova leads their head-to-head 1-0, but they haven’t played in almost three years. Also in action, Naomi Osaka will look for Grand Slam revenge against No.9 seed Johanna Konta. The Brit won the pair’s only previous encounter, which came in the second round of qualifying at the 2015 US Open. No.17 seed Caroline Wozniacki is hoping for another comfortable win in her rematch against Donna Vekic, who’s into the second round of a Grand Slam for the first time since 2015 French Open. Meanwhile, No.22 seed Daria Gavrilova carries home hopes in her second round clash against 19-year-old Ana Konjuh. Gavrilova is one of two Aussies remaining in the draw.

MELBOURNE, Australia – No.17 seed Caroline Wozniacki had little trouble in her straight-sets win against Donna Vekic, playing solid tennis to ease through 6-1, 6-3 in the second round of the Australian Open.

But Wozniacki will be happy with wrapping up the comfortable victory in just under an hour and twenty minutes, because awaiting in Round Three is the very in-form Johanna Konta.

The former No.1 got off to a strong start against Vekic, ruthlessly punishing any weak serve that came her way to rocket up to a double break lead. The Croat did her best to hang in there, occasionally foraying to the net and peppering her game with drop shots.

“I feel really good body-wise and mentally, which is huge for me,” Wozniacki said in her post-match press conference. “Patches of my matches have been really good. I thought I started off pretty well today. In the end, maybe a little bit too passive. But generally, I think it was steady and played pretty decent.”

Wozniacki struggled with her ball toss throughout the match under the bright midday sun on Rod Laver Arena, and a pair of double faults in the same game gave Vekic a chance to break back at 4-1, wrong-footing Wozniacki with her inside-out forehand winners. The momentary lapse did nothing to halt the Dane’s momentum and she got right back on track in the next game, breaking back and serving out the set comfortably.

She broke three more times in the final set, absorbing Vekic’s pace and rhythm to force the errors, which came fast and thick towards the end of the match. After just an hour and 18 minutes she made her way to the third round of the Australian Open for the first time since 2014.

The former No.1 was just too solid, hitting 21 winners to 9 unforced errors against Vekic’s 23 winners and 32 unforced errors. The Dane was also a force at the net, winning 80% of her 15 forays to the net.

She’ll look to continue that form against Konta, her opponent in the third round.

“She plays really well, you know, big forehand, big serve,” Wozniacki said. “But I’m ready. I’m playing well. I’m excited for the challenge.

“She’s obviously won last week in Sydney. She had a good last year. I’m here to fight. I’m here to do my best, and try and win the match.”

Caroline #Wozniacki is through to 3R #AusOpen pic.twitter.com/kJ0BoDLFFo

— #AusOpen (@AustralianOpen) 19 de enero de 2017