Tennis News

Being World No.1 certainly has its perks. Angelique Kerber capped a career-best season with a once-in-a-lifetime selfie with US President Barack Obama.

Kerber tweeted about meeting the 44th President of the United States:

A dream come true!! What an honour to meet President Obama for lunch today. pic.twitter.com/0AU6HUeuqV

— Angelique Kerber (@AngeliqueKerber) November 17, 2016

It’s already been a busy off-season for Kerber, who won a pair of Grand Slam titles at the Australian Open and US Open, and reached the final of the BNP Paribas WTA Finals Singapore presented by SC Global. The year-end No.1 also held a kid’s clinic, giving advice to the next generation of players:

the next tennis generation is really cute ? pic.twitter.com/6c1xTyzkAI

— Angelique Kerber (@AngeliqueKerber) November 16, 2016

Minutes after her tough 7-5, 6-4 loss to Garbiñe Muguruza in the Roland Garros final, Serena Williams walked directly into her post-match press conference. She was as open and honest as she felt she could be after minimal time to process the match, the loss, and her emotions.

Q: Are you the type of person who can kind of let this match go quickly, or will you beat yourself up about it for a few days?

SERENA WILLIAMS: I don’t really know right now. I’m just — obviously it’s not something I’m like, Oh, it’s over with. It’s definitely something I want to dissect and see what I can learn from that and what can I do to get better from it. That’s the only way to keep improving.

On Wednesday, Serena turned to social media to tell the world how she really felt. “I was pissed, I have to admit,” she said in a video posted by Uninterrupted. “I thought I could’ve played better, I thought I could’ve competed better, I thought I could’ve really done everything five times better. And I didn’t, and I was so pissed that I actually abandoned my rackets in France after maybe a few smashes of the racket bag.”

VIDEO: @SerenaWilliams on French Open loss: “I'm going to take a moment to be super honest … I was really pissed.”https://t.co/qJzaGOjrJZ

— UNINTERRUPTED (@uninterrupted) June 8, 2016

Thankfully Serena’s speech did not end there. Not to worry, tennis fans. The World No.1 is already back on court preparing for her assault on Wimbledon, where she will once again be the defending champion and aim to match the Open Era record of 22 major titles.

Said Serena: “I’m out here [on court] by myself because sometimes by yourself is when the great things really happen.”

Here’s what Serena said in its entirety:

“So I’m going to take a moment to be super candid and super honest.

“After Paris, the final, which is great, you know, for everyone on this planet with the exception of me — I don’t do what everyone else does — I was really pissed, I have to admit. I thought I could’ve played better, I thought I could’ve competed better, I thought I could’ve really done everything five times better. And I didn’t, and I was so pissed that I actually abandoned my rackets in France after maybe a few smashes of the racket bag. I felt like if I was going to play that awful and that crappy, that maybe I don’t need rackets. Maybe I can just show up to a tournament, and maybe I can get to a final without playing great, and without practice.

“But obviously that doesn’t work and sometimes you have to work extra hard. So I’m out here by myself because sometimes by yourself is when the great things really happen.”

BIRMINGHAM, Great Britain & MALLORCA, Spain – The official draw ceremonies for the Aegon Classic Birmingham and the Mallorca Open took place Saturday morning, and the stacked fields produced some exciting early matchups as some of the top players look to take their first steps on grass courts.

Click here to view the full Birmingham draw! | Click here to view the full Mallorca draw!

This year’s top seed at Birmingham is Agnieszka Radwanska. Last year, she skipped Birmingham in favor of Nottingham, but the Pole’s game loves the grass courts, and it was at this stage last year that Radwanska found her form and reignited a flagging season.

Radwanska has a tough road ahead if she looking to score her second title of 2016 at the Edgbaston Priory Club. Awaiting her in the first round is CoCo Vandeweghe, a big-serving American whose powerful game just clicks together on grass each season. Vandeweghe comes in to the matchup with plenty of matches under her belt too, having reached the final at the Ricoh Open.

If she gets past Vandeweghe, the top seed will face a qualifier in the second round, then potentially Caroline Wozniacki or Petra Kvitova in the quarterfinals, two players against whom she’s got a steep losing head-to-head record. She could run into last year’s finalist Karolina Pliskova – who’s into the final in Nottingham this week – in a potential semifinal matchup.

And of course, potentially awaiting in the final is the No.2 seed and defending Birmingham champion, Angelique Kerber.

The German’s road to the final is similarly treacherous: if she gets past Peng Shuai in the first round, Kerber’s potentially up against dangerous youngster Daria Gavrilova and her penchant for knocking out Top 10 players on the big stage. Possible quarterfinal opponents include Carla Suárez Navarro and Andrea Petkovic, while a matchup with Simona Halep could come in the semifinals.

The host country is well represented at the Aegon Classic Birmingham, with four Brits in the main draw: Heather Watson, Johanna Konta, Tara Moore and Naomi Broady.

Although all eyes are on Johanna Konta, the World No.18 who keeps climbing up the ranks, it’s been Moore whose recent performance has left an impression. She’s fresh off an appearance in the quarterfinals of the Aegon Open Nottingham, and has been drawn against Konta in the first round.

Possible Birmingham Quarterfinals:
Radwanska vs Kvitova
Bencic vs Ka. Pliskova
Keys vs Halep
Suárez Navarro vs Kerber

Notable early round matches:
Radwanska vs Vandeweghe (round 1)
Konta vs Moore (round 1)
Safarova vs Halep (round 1)
Wozniacki vs Kvitova (round 2)
Petkovic vs Suárez Navarro (round 2)
Gavrilova vs Kerber (round 2)

In Mallorca, reigning French Open champion and top seed Garbiñe Muguruza is back in action in her home country at the inaugural Mallorca Open. She’s joined by the likes of Jelena Jankovic, Ana Ivanovic, Eugenie Bourchard, and Kristina Mladenovic as they seek to become the International-level event’s first champion.

Muguruza won’t get a moment to rest once she steps onto the court to play her first grass court match of the year, though, because in the first round awaits the seemingly indefatigable Kristen Flipkens. The Belgian amassed an impressive winning streak of 19-3 on clay, but fell in the first round at the Ricoh Open.

Should Muguruza advance past Flipkens, she sets up a possible quarterfinal clash Laura Siegemund, and her semifinal opponents could include Ana Ivanovic and Caroline Garcia.

Mallorca’s No.2 seed is former World No.1 Jelena Jankovic, whose road to the final is loaded with possible landmines. Right out of the gates she’s set to face Ana Konjuh, last year’s Nottingham winner, and if she advances to the second round she gets Francesca Schiavone. Her potential quarterfinal opponents are Yulia Putintseva, Daniela Hantuchova and Yaroslava Shvedova, and in the semifinals she could play 2014 Wimbledon finalist Bouchard or Sabine Lisicki.

Possible Mallorca quarterfinals
Muguruza vs Siegemund
Ivanovic vs Garcia
Bouchard vs Mladenovic
Putintseva vs Jankovic

Notable early round matches
Muguruza vs Flipkens (round 1)
Lisicki vs Mladenovic (round 1)
Schiavone vs Jankovic (round 2)

HONOLULU, HI, USA – Top seed Zhang Shuai moved into the Hawaii Open semifinals on Friday with a hard-fought win over Samantha Crawford.

Watch free live streaming from Honolulu all week right here!

Breaks in the fifth game of both sets proved decisive as Zhang closed out a 6-4, 6-4 victory in an hour and 18 minutes.

Honolulu is the final event of a memorable year for Zhang that has seen her emerge as an unlikely standard bearer for Chinese tennis. Little more than 12 months ago, Zhang was contemplating retirement on the back of a dispiriting spell on tour. Sam Stosur talked her out of it and she has been on an upward trajectory ever since.

In January she ended her long-running Grand Slam hoodoo by making it all the way through qualifying and into the quarterfinals of the Australian Open, building on this platform with credible showings in Tokyo, Seoul, Beijing and Zhuhai to leave herself on the verge of the Top 20.

Meeting her for a place in the final will be No.6 seed Evgeniya Rodina, who posted a battling win over Sachia Vickery. Rodina, who won last week’s OEC Taipei WTA Challenger, was forced to dig deep against Vickery prevailing in a tense finale to triumph, 6-3, 3-6, 6-4, in a fraction under two hours.

Another player on the up is CiCi Bellis, who confidently booked her final four spot by swatting aside Sara Sorribes Tormo, 6-1, 6-1.

Bellis recently broke into the Top 100 for the first time after back-to-back titles on the ITF Circuit, and broke serve six times against Sorribes Tormo to extend her winning sequence to 12 matches. Next she faces Jacqueline Cako, who advanced when Sabine Lisicki retired with a shoulder injury.

Madison Keys has ended her coaching relationship with Thomas Hogstedt. Keys’ agent Max Eisenbud confirmed the split to WTA Insider. No new coach has been announced.

The news comes on the heels of Keys’ career-best season, which saw her qualify for her first BNP Paribas WTA Finals Singapore presented by SC Global and finish the year ranked No.8.

“Thomas and I have a rich history of working together with Li Na, Maria Sharapova and most recently Madison,” Eisenbud told WTA Insider. “His work with all three of these girls speaks for itself. Coaching on the women’s tour is not easy and sometimes these relationships just don’t work out, nothing more than that.”

Keys and Hogstedt, who also coached Caroline Wozniacki and Eugenie Bouchard, began working together in April and their collaboration netted immediate results. Keys made the biggest final of her career at the Italian Open in Rome and won her second career title at the Aegon Classic in Birmingham, England, launching her into the Top 10.

Their success continued over the summer hardcourt season, as Keys made another big final at the Rogers Cup in Montréal and the semifinals at the Olympic tennis event, before making the second week at her sixth straight Slam at the US Open.

Keys is currently scheduled to begin her season in Melbourne at the Australian Open.

News of the split follows two other high-profile coaching changes, as US Open finalist and World No.6 Karolina Pliskova ended her long-time work with Jiri Vanek and No.14 Elina Svitolina ended her partnership with Iain Hughes.