Google Play App Download

Tennis News

From around the world

News | WTA Tennis English

  • Posted: Jan 01, 1970

DUBAI, UAE – No.10 seed and 2011 Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships winner Caroline Wozniacki kept up her Middle East momentum on Monday, moving past rising Russian Daria Kasatkina, 6-2, 7-5 to advance into the second round.

“I knew it was going to be a tough match,” Wozniacki said during her on-court interview. “She mixes up the pace a lot and she has great hands and serves well. For me, it was important to play my own game and speed things up. I was pleased with my win.

“It’s much different conditions here,” she continued in her post-match press conference. “The ball is flying. The court is faster than in Doha.

“I didn’t really know how I was going to play to start off with. Generally, I was pleased with my game. Some serves were flying a little bit. I kind of have to adjust that for tomorrow.”

Kasatkina has been one of the players to watch over the last 12 months, and the Russian has backed up the hype with a pair of wins over Angelique Kerber at the Apia International Sydney and last week at the Qatar Total Open.

“I was watching her play last week during my rain delay and she was still playing a bit. I thought, ‘Gosh, she’s so young!’ I remember when I was 19, I thought I was all grown up, but she definitely has a great career ahead of her.”

Coming off a run to the Qatar Total Open final, Wozniacki’s experience and consistency proved too much for the flashy Kasatkina, hitting 17 winners to just 20 unforced errors – compared to 43 from the Russian teenager.

“I feel I can generate a lot of pace on these courts. I get to a lot of balls, too, which I think is frustrating for the other players that I can kind of go from defense to offense and really hurt them with that when they play a short ball.”

The Dane saved her best tennis for the key points, converting five of seven break point opportunities en route to the 90 minute victory.

“I won her back in 2011, and I’ve made many semifinals here, so I’ve had great matches here. It’s a lot of fun for me to be back; I was sorry to miss last year because of injury, but that makes coming back even better!”

Up next for the former World No.1 is Switzerland’s Viktorija Golubic, who ousted Turkish wildcard Cagla Buyukakcay in three tough sets on Sunday.

“I saw her name at a tournament somewhere last year at the end of last year,” she said of the Gstaad champion. “I think she played the finals, but that’s basically it.

“I know how she looks like, but I don’t know anything about her game. I will have to just scout some matches and go from there.”

Source link

News | WTA Tennis English

  • Posted: Jan 01, 1970

DUBAI, UAE – When not playing at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships, Caroline Garcia has been able to take in some of the sights the city has to offer. The Green Planet offered plenty for the Frenchwoman to see, and more than a handful of rare insects to touch!

Green Planet is an indoor vertical rainforest in Dubai, home to a collection of creatures Garcia got a chance to meet, and tweet about on social media:

What did she make of some of Green Planet’s creepiest crawlers? Check out the full video right here on wtatennis.com!

Source link

News | WTA Tennis English

  • Posted: Jan 01, 1970
DUBAI, UAE – Agnieszka Radwanska overcame the challenge of Belgian qualifier Elise Mertens in straight sets to make the third round of the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships.

“It’s always challenging to play someone for the first time and I didn’t know exactly what to expect,” said the No.4 seed. “It was a slow start from my side but I’m just happy to win my first match here in two sets. The first match is always tough. These are tough conditions and a little windy so the ball is flying everywhere but hopefully, match by match, it will be better.”

Mertens, who upset Tsvetana Pironkova in the opening round, gained the immediate break in the opening game to gain confidence at the start of the first meeting between the pair. But from then on, it was all Radwanska, the Pole surging back to take the opening set 6-3 before clinching the second set 6-2.

Radwanska, who won the tournament in 2012, will next face teenager Catherine Bellis who backed up her opening round win over Yulia Putintseva with another straight sets win over Laura Siegemund.

“It’s always great to go back to a place where you’ve won before and I’m going to do everything in my power to hold this trophy again,” added Radwanska. “It’s now a meeting with someone I haven’t played before so another change for me. Another young and very talented player so I hope I can win the first game and we’ll see how it goes.”

Source link

Coaches View: Halep's Rogers Cup Rally

Coaches View: Halep's Rogers Cup Rally

  • Posted: Jan 01, 1970

Simona Halep was able to win the longer rallies in her 7-6(2) 6-3 victory over Madison Keys to win the title at the Rogers Cup in Montréal.

SAP Tennis Analytics tracks how successful players are on varying rally lengths. During Sunday’s final, Halep won 62% of the rallies that were longer than six shots.

After a tight first set, Halep took control of the second by winning more of the medium-length rallies. After winning just 46% of the 3-6 shot rallies in the first set, Halep won 65% of those points in the second set.

Overall, Halep won 56% of the rallies that were greater than three shots throughout the match.

Rally length is included in the “Rally hit to” tracking on the SAP Coaches View. That particular data shows where each shot during a rally lands on the opponent’s side of the court. The display differentiates between forehands and backhands, and can be filtered by a particular score or to only show winners, unforced errors, service returns, the last shot of a rally or the third shot (first rally ball hit by the server).

For the Rogers Cup final, this data set also shows that Halep not only was winning the longer points, but she was also looking to keep the ball away from the Keys forehand. Halep directed 57% of her shots toward the Keys backhand, and for good reason. During the match, 13 of the 17 winners Keys hit came from her forehand.

The SAP Coaches View combines scoring information direct from the chair umpire with tracking data from HawkEye to allow for an in depth look at five different aspects of a match. Each tracking option can be filtered to narrow the focus to specific situations within a match, such as break points. This information is available directly to coaches in real-time during a match on their SAP tablet and also available to them online after matches.

On Sunday, Halep’s success on the longer points in the match allowed her to win her third trophy in 2016.

SAP

Source link

News | WTA Tennis English

News | WTA Tennis English

  • Posted: Jan 01, 1970

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.”

CiCi Bellis

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.”

Source link

Vote: July's Player Of The Month

Vote: July's Player Of The Month

  • Posted: Jan 01, 1970

It’s time to vote for July’s WTA Player of the Month!

Have a look at the nominees and cast your vote before Thursday at 11:59pm ET! The winner will be announced Friday, August 5.

July 2016 WTA Player Of The Month Finalists

Simona Halep: One year after reaching her first Rogers Cup final in Toronto, Halep went one better in Montréal, growing though a tough field that included Karolina Pliskova, Svetlana Kuznetsova, Angelique Kerber, and Madison Keys to win her first title in Canada, and her third of the season. Halep is currently riding a 10-match winning streak after winning at home in Bucharest on clay.

Madison Keys: Finishing a close second to Halep in Montréal, Keys returned to the Top 10 – and the Top 8 on the Road to Singapore leaderboard – by reaching her first-ever hardcourt final on the WTA tour. A three-set win over former World No.1 Venus Williams set the tone for the week, as she knocked out an in-form Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and qualifier Kristina Kucova to make the championship match.

Johanna Konta The British No.1 won her first WTA title in style at the Bank of the West Classic, defeating Venus Williams for the second time this season to reach another career-high ranking – falling just short of a Top 10 debut after making the quarterfinals of the Rogers Cup.

Venus Williams: Venus earned her eighth career Stanford final in July, and played Konta tough in a three-set defeat. Her solid run of form continued in Montréal, where she reached the round of 16. 

POTM

2016 Winners

January: Angelique Kerber
February: Carla Suárez Navarro
March: Victoria Azarenka
April: Angelique Kerber
May: Garbiñe Muguruza
June: Serena Williams

How it works:

Finalists are selected by wtatennis.com
Winner is then determined by a fan vote on wtatennis.com

Source link

News | WTA Tennis English

  • Posted: Jan 01, 1970

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:

 “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.

Radwanska was game and readily accepted the challenge on Twitter:

But will it be enough for Kerber to dethrone Radwanska and claim February WTA Shot Of The Month? Stay tuned…

Source link

CNN Open Court: Maria Bueno

  • Posted: Jan 01, 1970

Tennis was no longer an Olympic sport when Maria Bueno was in her heyday, but should it have been then she would surely have walked away with gold.

During the 1950s and 1960s, Bueno lifted 19 Grand Slam titles in singles and doubles to establish herself as the greatest Brazilian to ever wield a racquet. Fittingly, the venue where the modern day greats will vie for medals at the upcoming Rio Games has been named after Sao Paulo’s favorite sporting daughter.

Now in her 70s, Bueno still plays regularly at her hometown club. One of these slots was set aside for Pat Cash and CNN Open Court to discuss her instinctive game, Grand Slam memories and, of course, the recently inaugurated Olympic Tennis Centre.

Source link