SAP Stat Of The Day: CiCi Bellis
In today’s SAP Stat Of The Day, 17-year-old CiCi Bellis’ victory over Agnieszka Radwanska set a record in more ways than one.
In today’s SAP Stat Of The Day, 17-year-old CiCi Bellis’ victory over Agnieszka Radwanska set a record in more ways than one.
Ana Ivanovic had Wednesday’s shot of the day at the St. Petersburg Ladies Trophy.
CINCINNATI, OH, USA – And then there were eight! It’s quarterfinal Friday at the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati. Chris Oddo previews the match-ups for wtatennis.com.
Friday, Quarterfinals
Center Court
[2] Angelique Kerber (GER #2) vs. [9] Carla Suárez Navarro (ESP #12)
Head-to-head: Kerber leads, 4-3
Key Stat: Kerber could ascend to the No.1 ranking with the title in Cincinnati.
Angelique Kerber is focused on the day-in, day-out aspects of being a top WTA pro. The rest of us? We’re curious to see if the German has what it takes to end Serena Williams’ remarkable 183-week reign atop the WTA’s rankings. Kerber could achieve that milestone with a title run, but it’s the furthest thing from her mind at the moment. While we watch the story unfold on Friday when Kerber meets Carla Suárez Navarro for a spot in the semis, the World No.2 will be concentrating on process. “On the court I’m really trying to focus and play my best tennis,” she said on Thursday after defeating Barbora Strycova in straight sets. “And my goal is always to go on court and win the match. Of course I mean it’s a goal to be one day the No.1, but let’s see if it happens, when it happens, whatever. I will not be putting this pressure on myself – I’m just trying to play step by step.” It’s the best way to proceed for Kerber, and so far in Cincinnati she has been able to deflect the pressure and play the type of tennis that got her to this point. Will she be able to continue her rise against the feisty Spaniard who defeated her earlier this summer in Birmingham? Or will Suárez Navarro, already one of three Premier 5 titlists this season, make her own story unfold?
Pick: Suárez Navarro in three
[3] Simona Halep (ROU #4) vs. [5] Agnieszka Radwanska (POL #5)
Head-to-head: Radwanska leads, 5-4
Key Stat: Halep stretched her win streak to 12 with a straight-sets victory over Daria Gavrilova on Wednesday.
Red-hot Simona Halep is loving life in Cincinnati. And why shouldn’t she be? The Romanian is well-rested, suited aptly for the fast-playing conditions at the Lindner Family Tennis Center, and gaining confidence with each successive victory. Halep made it 12 in a row on Thursday when she rolled past Aussie qualifier Daria Gavrilova, and afterwards she cited her legs as the biggest contributor to her recent success. She says her recent training block with Gil Reyes, former trainer of Andre Agassi, has helped her fitness immensely, and she also confirmed that the injuries that sabotaged her play early in the season are behind her. It all adds up to a very formidable Halep, one that is looking more and more like a title contender each day. She’ll have to be formidable on Friday if she is to get by No.5-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska. Radwanska reached her fourth Cincinnati quarterfinal in five years on Thursday by coming from behind to defeat Johanna Konta in three sets. Will Radwanska be able to stop the run of surging Halep in their 10th meeting, or will the Romanian’s scorching form prove too much to handle yet again?
Pick: Halep in three
Grandstand
[7] Svetlana Kuznetsova (RUS #10) vs. [15] Karolina Pliskova (CZE #17)
Head-to-head: First meeting
Key Stat: Kuznetsova improved to 15-4 in deciding sets this year with her win third-round win over Timea Bacsinszky.
It has been a fantastic season for 31-year-old Svetlana Kuznetsova. She achieved her first win over a reigning world No.1 since 2009 in Miami when she snapped Serena Williams’ 20-match winning streak at the event. And that’s not even the half of it. Kuznetsova, now the top-ranked Russian and inside the Top 10 for the first time since 2010, has won 30 matches, claimed her 16th career title, and been a threat to go deep in every draw she has played. Occupying the 10th spot in the Road to Singapore standings, the Russian is playing for valuable points in the next months, and she’ll look to continue pushing her momentum forward when she meets 15th-seed Karolina Pliskova for the first time on Friday. The bomb-serving Czech still hasn’t made her mark at the Slams but she has been lethal elsewhere, with four semifinals, two finals and a title to her name this season. Here in Cincinnati, she has yet to drop a set in two matches.
Pick: Kuznetsova in three
[4] Garbiñe Muguruza (ESP #3) vs. [Q] Timea Babos (HUN #41)
Head-to-head: Muguruza leads, 3-0
Key Stat: Their last two battles have gone to three sets.
There is fire in the eyes of Garbiñe Muguruza this week in Cincinnati, and that’s bad news for her competitors. The Spaniard had an understandable dip in level after winning her maiden Grand Slam in Paris this year, but she appears to be very determined to put that behind her as she prepares to ramp up her game ahead of the year’s final major. Muguruza has yet to drop a set in Cincinnati and though she was pushed at times by Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova on Thursday, she played a very solid match, particularly from the service stripe where she saved six of seven break points and won 31 of 41 first-serve points. On Friday she’ll face one of the tour’s most improved players in 23-year-old Timea Babos. The Hungarian produced an upset on Thursday in defeating eighth-seeded Dominika Cibulkova. It was the Hungarian’s biggest win of the year rankings-wise, but she’s 1-10 against the Top 10 lifetime and 0-3 against Muguruza. She’ll need something magical to push past a resurgent Muguruza on Friday.
Pick: Muguruza in two
By the numbers…
306 – Number of weeks that Serena Williams has held the No. 1 ranking, which is third-most all time behind Martina Navratilova (332) and Steffi Graf (377).ber of consecutive weeks that Serena Williams has held the No. 1 ranking, which is third-most all time behind Martina Navratilova (332) and Steffi Graf (377).
41 – Babos’ position in the world rankings – the lowest of the draw’s eight remaining players.
19-2 – Halep’s record since the start of Roland Garros this year.
7 – Number of seeded players that have advanced to the quarterfinals in Cincinnati.
DUBAI, UAE – Caroline Wozniacki is only 26 years old – so she was taken by surprise to hear her quarterfinal opponent at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships say she had admired her since childhood.
“Both [Agnieszka] Radwanska and Wozniacki have been, you know, my idols since I was really young and watched them play on the TV since I was five years old,” revealed 17-year-old CiCi Bellis after beating the Pole 6-4, 2-6, 6-2.
Wozniacki’s win over Kateryna Bondarenko, 3-6, 6-2, 6-3, set up a clash between the current WTA World No.15 and her teenage admirer.
“Obviously we have been on tour for so long and played so many matches and been on TV for a lot of years,” said the Dane. “I think sometimes you just don’t realize how young these girls are that are coming up.
“But we were one of them, too. Aga and I were both really young when we broke through. You know, it’s my 12th year on tour now, so, you know, we have been here for a while – although I still feel young at heart.”
Wozniacki reminisced about her own time as a teenager breaking through – and those senior stateswomen of the game who welcomed her
“Someone like Kim Clijsters was always nice,” she recalled. “Venus was one of the first ones, as well. She asked me to play doubles with her in Qatar, actually, when I was 17. So that was huge for me. And then Serena was really nice.
“I’m not saying everybody, but I think the older players back in the day really appreciated us having that respect towards them. Not on the court, obviously. We wanted to win. But we were always very respectful of them and their achievements at the same time we were fighters and competitors.”
That means that Wozniacki will not be taking the young American lightly.
“I think she obviously tries to dictate with the forehand,” she said. “You know, it’s a player with a lot of energy. I just need to be out there and just show my presence – and try and stay aggressive.”
Top-ranked doubles team and WTA co-No.1s Martina Hingis and Sania Mirza brought their 36-match winning streak to the St. Petersburg Ladies Tophy, adding to their total with a first round win over Jelena Ostapenko and Evgeniya Rodina, 7-5, 7-5.
“We didn’t know how to play them that well in the beginning,” Hingis said in their post-match press conference. “We lost an opportunity at 3-2, 40-0 to go up and close out the match, and they came back to play a couple of really good games – especially Ostapenko, who hit some really great shots.
“I think it was great experience for them to play a match like that, and also for us to get into the tournament. I’m definitely happy we didn’t have to play a deciding set. It’s always nice to close out in straight sets; it makes us that much stronger.”
Hingis and Mirza haven’t lost a match since last August at the Western & Southern Opent, their now-37-match winning streak having taken them to titles at the US Open, BNP Paribas WTA Finals Singapore presented by SC Global, and the Australian Open – with only the French Open standing between them and a possible “Santina Slam.”
“The streak that we’re on is amazing,” Mirza said. “To be honest, we knew we could play good, but not this good. We’re surprising ourselves as well, and we just want to keep going.
Asked about the media’s fascination with their streak, the longest since Jana Novotna and Helena Sukova won 44 straight matches in 1990, Mirza didn’t mince words.
“We’re counting, also.”
“Yes, we are,” Hingis added.
For Hingis, the partnership with Mirza marks her second to truly capture the imagination of the tennis world, the first being her late-90s domination with Russia’s own Anna Kournikova – still a popular topic in the St. Petersburg press room.
“She was a great player, a team player, and we had great times for those two years,” Hingis said, speaking about their two Australian Open victories in 1999 and 2002.
“She kind of was the one who started this Russian Armada – or Russian generation – along with Elena Likhovtseva. She was definitely the one who you could aim for and be like, go around the world and live the ‘Russian-American dream.’ I loved playing with her.
“We stay in touch, especially during the Miami event; we always try to see each other. I follow what she’s doing; she follows me.”
Mirza too fondly remembers the ‘Spice Girls’ of the women’s doubles circuit.
“At that time I think TV was not as evolved as it is today, combined with the computer, so it was not so easy to get to see matches all the time. But everybody knew Martina Hingis, everybody knew Anna Kournikova, and everybody knew that this partnership was winning a lot, and probably was one of the best doubles teams to play.
“She’s not that much older than me,” she added with a laugh. “Only five years; it’s just that she’s been around for such a long time!”
Another partnership Hingis looks forward to exploring involves fellow Swiss Roger Federer, who agreed to play mixed doubles with her at the upcoming Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro.
“I waited 10 months, and maybe after winning a lot with Sania, and becoming No.1 again and winning three mixed titles, I was hoping that would be persuasion enough to partner up.”
‘SanTina’ next face an all-Russian pair for a spot in the quarterfinals and Win number 38: rising Russian star Daria Kasatkina and Elena Vesnina, Mirza’s former doubles partner.
“We played together for a long time; she’s a very good friend of mine, and we’ve known each other since we were 13 years old.
“I have a feeling that the crowd will be behind them because she’s quite popular here, but hopefully there will be some people supporting us.”
Asked if they foresaw their partnership transcending to other endeavors, Hingis said they planned to let their racquets do the talking.
“We’ll stick to tennis; that’s what we do best.”
All photos courtesy of Getty Images.
CINCINNATI, OH, USA – Angelique Kerber fought back to defeat Carla Suárez Navarro at the Western & Southern Open and move within touching distance of claiming the No.1 ranking.
Watch live action from Cincinnati this week on WTA Live powered by TennisTV!
By winning the title in Cincinnati, Kerber will end Serena Williams’ 183-week reign as World No.1, and she kept the dream alive with a 4-6, 6-3, 6-0 victory on Friday aftrnoon.
Earlier this summer Suárez Navarro edged Kerber in a high-quality encounter in Birmingham. While the rematch failed to scale these heights, for a set and a half it looked like the result would go the same way.
The chase for top spot has now seen Kerber play 21 matches since the start of June, and at times against Suárez Navarro she appeared to be running on empty. Her usual consistency from the back of the court conspicuous by its absence, the No.2 seed committed 17 unforced errors in dropping the opening set.
Fortunately for the German, the soaring temperatures and a leg injury caused her opponent to fall away spectacularly, struggling in vain to keep fatigue at bay. The turning point came midway through the second set, a scrappy game giving Kerber a 4-2 and some much-needed momentum.
Willing herself forward, she hung onto this lead, swinging a serve out wide and beyond Suárez Navarro’s reach to level the match. This positivity continued into the decider, a brilliant angled backhand bringing an immediate break as she hurtled towards a semifinal meeting with either Simona Halep.
“I think I changed a little bit my game in the second set: I was trying to go for it when I have the chance and to making the rallies a little bit shorter,” Kerber said. “I was still thinking that I can turn around the match even after losing the first set and going down a break early in the next set.”
DUBAI, UAE – Just days after throwing down the WTA Shot Of The Month gauntlet to trick shots queen Agnieszka Radwanska, World No.2 Angelique Kerber produced yet another highlight-worthy piece of brilliance at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships – and this time she even went right handed for it!
Watch Kerber switch hands for a right-handed reflex volley in her WTA Shot Of The Day from her quarterfinal against Ana Konjuh:
Speed and soft hands from @AngeliqueKerber! ? pic.twitter.com/Ti8X0o1Ej5
— WTA (@WTA) February 23, 2017
“I don’t think [I’ve ever hit a right-handed volley before],” Kerber laughed in her post-match press conference. “I think this point — yeah, I have no idea. I just react, so it was just maybe a little bit luck, as well.”
She added, “I’m naturally right handed. Maybe that helps me in this point.”
On Tuesday, Kerber’s 26-shot rally against Mona Barthel prompted the German to muse out loud about displacing perennial hot-shot winner Radwanska, who not only took home January’s WTA Shot Of The Month but also owns the WTA Shot Of The Year Award for the last four years.
She’s coming for you @ARadwanska… pic.twitter.com/q11Hc9WD6Z
— WTA Insider (@WTA_insider) February 21, 2017
Radwanska was game and readily accepted the challenge on Twitter:
Game on ???@AngeliqueKerber https://t.co/0S9L0qIsjJ
— Aga Radwanska (@ARadwanska) February 21, 2017
@ARadwanska ???
— Angelique Kerber (@AngeliqueKerber) February 21, 2017
But will it be enough for Kerber to dethrone Radwanska and claim February WTA Shot Of The Month? Stay tuned…
ST. PETERSBURG, Russia – Ana Ivanovic moved confidently in the semifinals of the St. Petersburg Ladies Open with a 6-1, 7-5 win over qualifier Kateryna Kozlova.
Watch live action from St. Petersburg & Kaohsiung this week on WTA Live powered by TennisTV!
In her opening round match Ivanovic took a while to get into her groove, but against Kozlova she hit the ground running, reeling off five straight games to pocket the opening set in 23 minutes. Kozlova, who was appearing the quarterfinals of a Premier event for the first time, gave a better account of herself in the second, battling back from 5-3 down before eventually succumbing.
Meeting Ivanovic for a place in the final will be another of the draw’s more established names, Roberta Vinci. And Vinci needed to draw on all her experience to see off Timea Babos in an absorbing encounter, 7-6(3), 4-6, 7-6(4).
Babos was in command for much of the final set – leading 5-3 and then 4-2 in the tie-break – but was unable to find the decisive blow. The decisive moment came in the 10th point of the tie-break when Vinci skipped around a second serve only to flash a forehand fractionally wide.
The Hungarian’s relief was short-lived, though, Hawk-Eye adjudging the ball to have clipped the outer edge of the sideline. This successful challenge took the No.2 seed to match point, which she converted when Babos sent a weary forehand sailing beyond the baseline.
“It was a long match, a tough match. Timea has a great serve – always 190km/h. Tough for me to return,” Vinci said. “I was 5-3 down at the end, but I stayed focused and won a great match today.
“In those moments you have to stay positive and don’t think about the score. In the end she was probably a little bit nervous, and a little bit tight, she missed some easy balls and I won.”
Vinci has lost six of her previous nine meetings with Ivanovic, although the two have not crossed paths for a couple of years.
“Ana is a great player. Of course it will be a difficult match. But I’m in the semifinals, nothing to lose, just enjoy! I will try my best – I need to be aggressive every single point. We will see.”
CINCINNATI, OH, USA – Top seed Angelique Kerber kept her bid for the WTA’s top ranking alive after defeating Simona Halep 6-3, 6-4 to reach the final at the Western & Southern Open.
Watch live action from Cincinnati this week on WTA Live powered by TennisTV!
With back to back titles at Bucharest and Montréal, Halep came into the matchup on the back of a 13-match winning streak, and without ever having lost to Kerber on hardcourts. They’d played six times previously and while Kerber owns one win on clay and one on grass, Halep had won all four of their hardcourt matches, including their last meeting in the semifinals of the Rogers Cup.
The players traded breaks to open the match. Halep was playing fast, going for quick winners but earning loose unforced errors, instead. The conditions didn’t help, either, as the win wreaked havoc on her normally sharp timing.
Another spot of Cincinnati’s rain came down again and suspended play for half an hour with both players on serve and Kerber leading 4-3. Upon resumption, Halep’s woes continued as she was quickly broken. The German rattled off five straight games to take the opening set and carve out a 4-0 lead in the second.
Follow live game-by-game analysis from Cincinnati semifinals day on WTA Insider’s Live Blog.
Calmer now in the second set despite the deficit, Halep began leaning into her backhand and taking control of the points. She rattled off three games in a row to narrow Kerber’s lead to just one break. But the German slammed the door on a Halep comeback, saving break point at 5-3 and outrallying her to draw out two errors from the Romanian.
With the finish line in sight, the match had one final hurdle for the World No.2: Kerber broke her string on match point, but a misplaced lob from Halep drifted wide to give Kerber the win anyways.
.@AngeliqueKerber is ONE win away from becoming World No.1! #CincyTennis https://t.co/ii3DU83AYF
— WTA (@WTA) August 20, 2016
“My strings have never broken! And it just broke during the match, and on match point. I was just hoping the ball would go in because I don’t know what to do with the racquet!”
Although Halep hit more winners than Kerber – 21 to Kerber’s 12 – she also hit a whopping 50 unforced errors against Kerber’s 21. The Romanian also struck five double faults and converted just three of five break points, while Kerber won five out of 15.
With the win, Kerber returns to the final of the Western & Southern Open for the first time since 2012, but there’s an even bigger prize up for grabs than just the Cincy title.
Should Kerber win in tomorrow’s final, the reigning Australian Open champion would overtake Serena Williams as WTA World No.1, snapping the American’s streak at 306 consecutive weeks.
“I think of course I’m playing now some of my best tennis,” Kerber said of the possibility of taking the top spot. “It’s one of the best years in my career. I had a lot of up and downs in the last few years and I had a lot of experience from which I learned.
“I think now I’m showing that I’m really one of the best tennis players.
“It’s still one match away, but it’s still a long match. I will not thinking about this yet. It’s a new opponent, a new day, and after that we will see what happened yeah, it’s not over yet. Still one match to go.”
Only Karolina Pliskova stands between Kerber and the top spot, and the No-17-ranked Czech is up for the challenge.
“I don’t know if she would be a little bit in stress or something, but I would love to have her as a No. 1 after few years. But I’ll do anything for her to not getting there,” Pliskova said.
Top seed Timea Babos had to go the distance against Oceane Dodin – but an impressive deciding set took her through to the semifinals in Budapest.