Charleston: Vesnina vs. Siegemund
Elena Vesnina takes on Laura Siegemund in the quarterfinals of the Volvo Car Open.
Elena Vesnina takes on Laura Siegemund in the quarterfinals of the Volvo Car Open.
SINGAPORE – Last year’s semifinalist Garbiñe Muguruza returns to Singapore looking to end and an up and down season on a high note.
1. Twice is Nice.
Garbiñe Muguruza makes her second consecutive appearance in the Singapore singles competition following her debut last year, where she reached the semifinals after finishing 3-0 in round robin play.
2. Double Threat.
It will be her third consecutive appearance at the WTA Finals, having qualified first in doubles with compatriot Carla Suárez Navarro in 2014 and 2015 when they reached the final.
3. Rocking Round Robin.
Last year, she went 3-0 in the round-robin stage of the singles competition, losing to eventual champion Agnieszka Radwanska in the semifinals.
4. Fabulous in France.
Muguruza is the reigning Roland Garros champion, picking up her first-ever Grand Slam title by beating then-World No.1 Serena Williams in the final.
5. First Slam.
The Spaniard became the youngest first-time Grand Slam champion (22 years, 7 months) since Victoria Azarenka, who won the 2012 Australian Open aged 22 years, 6 months.
6. Breakthrough season.
Muguruza’s French Open win followed her brilliant 2015 season, when she finished the year as World No.3.
Esta es la foto que quería. This is the photo I really like. @rolandgarros pic.twitter.com/5mAZjyXn1e
— Garbiñe Muguruza (@GarbiMuguruza) 4 June 2016
7. Early exits.
Her Slam record in the second half of 2016 has seen her signature peaks and valleys, losing to Jana Cepelova, 6-3, 6-2, at Wimbledon, and to Latvia’s Anastasija Sevastova, 7-5, 6-4, at the US Open – both in the second round.
8. Terrific on tour.
Muguruza nonetheless made semifinal appearances at the Internazionali BNL d’Italia and the Western & Southern Open, plus quarterfinals at the Qatar Total Open , Porsche Tennis Grand Prix and the Toray Pan Pacific Open.
9. Limping in Linz.
She has not had the ideal preparation for Singapore; she was forced to withdraw from a quarterfinal encounter with Viktorija Golubic in Linz after rolling her ankle.
10. Rankings rise.
She hit a career-high of World No.2 after the French Open – and will be ready to push on from her current slot of World No.6 as she looks ahead to 2017.
THE WINNERS
Sloane Stephens was a point from a one-set deficit against 2011 Volvo Car Open finalist Elena Vesnina, but the young American turned the tide in emphatic style, capturing her third title of the season, 7-6(4), 6-2.
“I just said to myself, ‘You have to fight for every point and compete.’ She’s a great player, so I knew I had to stay in every point,” Stephens said after the match.
“Obviously coming into here I have a lot of anxiety coming into this tournament because I’ve never done well here. I just thought, you know, I’m just going to go have fun. “I don’t have anything to lose. My life is great. It’s tennis. And this is what I do every week. So I kind of just changed my mindset, and that worked. So I should just do that every week.”
Read the full story and watch highlights here.
Meanwhile, Dominika Cibulkova captured her first WTA final since 2014 at the Katowice Open, taking out three-time finalist Camila Giorgi, 6-4, 6-0. Cibulkova was in her second final of 2016 – having narrowly missed out on the Abierto Mexicano Telcel title to Sloane Stephens.
“You have to go by small steps, and this is just a small step for me to get to where I want to be,” said Cibulkova, who missed much of 2015 recovering from an Achilles injury. “I proved that through the last matches – how I finished them – that I’m a really good player and this is how I want to play.”
Read the full story here.
GAME, SET, MATCH: WTA Insider
Game: Sloane Stephens’ Premier Milestone.
From being match point down to Daria Kasatkina in the quarterfinals to tournament champion on Sunday, Stephens’ run to her biggest career title at the Volvo Car Open was as much of a rollercoaster as her 2016 season, which has been all about the boom or bust. Stephens has played six tournaments this year. In three she lost in her opening match (Australian Open, Indian Wells, Miami), in the other three she went on to win the title (ASB Classic, Abierto Mexicano TELCEL, and Volvo Car Open). When Sloane Stephens wins, she wins in bunches.
Prior to this year, Stephens carried a dismal 1-5 record in Charleston, a frustrating clip given how much she loved the tournament, the city, and playing on clay. This year, Stephens knocked off three quality Top 40 players in Daria Gavrilova, Daria Kasatkina, and Australian Open champion Angelique Kerber (Kerber retired due to a viral illness) en route to the final, where she was pushed to the limit in the first set before defeating Elena Vesnina 7-6(4), 6-2.
Set: Dominika Cibulkova’s Slow Climb.
Cibulkova has been playing well above her ranking this year. More often than not she’s been the most dangerous unseeded player at the tour’s biggest events so far. Her romp to her first title since 2014 was no big surprise at the Katowice Open. Cibulkova dropped just one set all week and capped off her semifinal and final wins with second set bagels. This was a dominant and deserved week for Cibulkova, who is up to No.38 in the rankings.
Match: Angelique Kerber and Lara Arruabarrena put on a show.
It wasn’t a match many people saw, but Kerber’s 6-2, 5-7, 7-6(3) win over Arruabarrena was some inspired stuff from both women, particularly the Spaniard. Ranked No.80, Arruabarrena looked to be primed for a quick exit after the first set, which was no surprise given her road to Charleston:
Sunday (Osprey's ITF)
Semis 2 sets???
Final 3 sets???
??–8 hours–> Charleston 3am
Monday (Charleston WTA)
1R 3 sets???Tomorrow 2R… ?
— Lara Arruabarrena (@laraarrua) April 5, 2016
Arruabarrena found a way to raise her level and gave Kerber everything she had for the next two hours, as the two slugged it out on a cool night on the green clay. In the end it was Kerber’s resilience and experience that brought her over the finish line, but this was a performance to remember for Arruabarrena. It was one of the best matches of the year.
For matches like this i play tennis
A shame i lost but i had such a figther at the other site of the net. Best of luck for @AngeliqueKerber— Lara Arruabarrena (@laraarrua) April 6, 2016
RANKING MOVERS:
Notable singles ranking movers for the week of April 11, 2016.
Elena Vesnina (RUS), +34 (No.85 to 51): Vesnina’s run to the final of the Volvo Car Open gives her the biggest ranking jump of the week and puts her within reach of the Top 50. Vesnina, a finalist in Charleston in 2011, had to play through qualifying just to reach the main draw.
Dominika Cibulkova (SVK), +15 (No.53 to 38): Cibulkova claimed her first title of the year – and her first since 2014 – at the Katowice Open this week and earned a 15-point ranking jump, putting her back into the Top 40.
Sloane Stephens (USA), +4 (No.25 to 21): Stephens grabbed her third title of the year at the Volvo Car Open and keeps inching higher and higher up the rankings – this week she’s up to No.21.
Daria Kasatkina (RUS), +3 (No.35 to 32): 18-year-old Kasatkina reached her first Premier-level quarterfinal on clay this week in Charleston, sending her up three spots to No.32. Even more significantly, the jump gives her a greater chance of being seeded at the French Open.
Agnieszka Radwanska (POL), +1 (No.3 to 2): Radwanska and Angelique Kerber continue their tug-of-war with the No.2 spot – they’ve traded it off four times in the last four ranking runs.
UPCOMING TOURNAMENTS
Claro Open Colsanitas
Bogotá, Colombia
International | $226,750 | Clay
Monday, April 11 – Sunday, April 17, 2016
Porsche Tennis Grand Prix
Stuttgart, Germany
Premier | $693,900 | Clay, Indoor
Monday, April 18 – Sunday, April 24, 2016
TOP 20 PLAYER SCHEDULES
1. Serena Williams
2. Agnieszka Radwanska – Stuttgart
3. Angelique Kerber – Stuttgart
4. Garbiñe Muguruza – Stuttgart
5. Victoria Azarenka
6. Simona Halep – Stuttgart
7. Petra Kvitova – Stuttgart
8. Roberta Vinci – Stuttgart
9. Maria Sharapova
10. Belinda Bencic – Stuttgart
11. Carla Suárez Navarro – Stuttgart
12. Flavia Pennetta
13. Svetlana Kuznetsova – Stuttgart
14. Venus Williams
15. Lucie Safarova – Stuttgart
16. Elina Svitolina – Bogotá
17. Timea Bacsinszky
18. Karolina Pliskova – Stuttgart
19. Ana Ivanovic – Stuttgart
20. Sara Errani
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!
Best wishes to those celebrating birthdays this week:
Elizaveta Kulichkova (RUS) – April 12, 1996
Richel Hogenkamp (NED) – April 16, 1992
Taylor Townsend (USA) – April 16, 1996
If Elaine Brady is on the court during a match, it usually means a player has called for a medical timeout. As one of the WTA’s primary healthcare providers since 2007, she is often a last resort between play continuing or ending in a retirement.
But her most important work is done away from the floodlights of a stadum court, as injury prevention takes much more time than the six minutes a medical timeout allows.
“Most work each day is aimed towards preventative strategies,” says Brady, who earned a degree in physiotherapy and a masters in orthopedic medicine. “That may be preparing an athlete effectively for her match and assessing injuries she’s already got.
“All the work behind the scenes in the training room, but we’re most visible when an athlete injures themselves on the court during the match and we’re called to court to treat them.”
Fans might not always be happy to see Brady on court, but the players are certainly grateful.
“They have to deal with me and my bad moods sometimes,” jokes Garbiñe Muguruza. “They take care of all my tapes every day, and I think they’re very important and I’m very thankful to have them at every tournament.”
Learn more about Brady’s line of work in the latest episode of On The Tour.
Sloane Stephens takes on Elena Vesnina in the final of the Volvo Car Open.
SINGAPORE – Most of the time, players tend to offer identical analysis of a tournament’s court speed. Clay is slower than hardcourts, which are, in turn, slower than grass and indoor courts. But within that hierarchy lies a maddening gradient of quick clay courts and slow hardcourts that can make it difficult to assess which court will favor a player on any given week.
Speaking at Saturday’s All-Access hour, Agnieszka Radwanska, Simona Halep, Karolina Pliskova, Garbiñe Muguruza, Madison Keys, and Dominika Cibulkova were all asked to give their take on the BNP Paribas WTA Finals Singapore presented by SC Global’s Centre Court. The consensus was admittedly hard to gauge.
“I don’t remember last year, but I think it’s so slow,” Muguruza said. “It’s so slow. I think there’s going to be hard matches in that surface.
“But I love the court. It’s such a great show and environment, so we’ll put the effort there.”
Coming from the Generali Ladies Linz, Keys agreed that the court was slower than a player might find at the average indoor, but even that criticism is relative.
“They’re playing a little bit slower than what Linz was playing, but it was actually really nice to be able to go and play an indoor tournament and then come here. It feels pretty similar. The ball stays really low. Definitely a faster court, so I’m not complaining about that.”
Winning Linz to qualify for Singapore, Cibulkova thought it had less to do with speed and more to do with bounce, which will be crucial for the big-hitting Slovak to get her rhythm on Sunday’s first round robin match against Halep.
“I thought the surface would be pretty similar [to Linz], but it’s not. It’s very different. It bounces and it’s a little bit faster.
“So I still have to get used to it. It’s good that it’s at least indoor, that I don’t have to get used to indoor and outdoor.”
Runner-up in 2014, Halep pointed to the slowness of the court as one of the reasons why she liked playing at the WTA Finals, but Pliskova wasn’t sure the court played as slow as her colleagues insisted.
“I definitely wouldn’t say it’s fast, but it could be slower. I’ve played on slower surfaces so I was expecting it’s going to be even slower what I heard from last year from the girls.
“I would say it’s somewhere in the middle. For the serve I think it’s pretty fast, but when you play the rally it’s not that fast.
“Hopefully for the crowd they are going to see some rallies and good shots from the players.”
One would expect Radwanska, the defending champion, to have the definitive answer when it came to court speed. The Pole ultimately seemed as mystified as her peers, but if there’s one thing the shotmaker knows how to do on any surface, it’s improvise:
Q. You were here a couple days ago. One of earliest players here. Have you had a hit on court? Have the conditions changed from last year?
AGNIESZKA RADWANSKA: I think, of course, the surface is very similar [to last year]. It’s the same. I think it’s a bit faster because it’s already been used [this week]. But I don’t think it’s that slow as last year. That’s what I notice.
But, well, it’s always a little bit tough for us to play indoors. I think I just play one indoor tournament in Stuttgart and then here. It’s good to be here a couple days earlier to adjust to the conditions.
All photos courtesy of Getty Images.
Dominika Cibulkova’s hopes of qualifying for a debut appearance at the BNP Paribas WTA Finals Singapore presented by SC Global came down to the wire. The Slovak needed to win the Generali Ladies Linz to assure herself a spot among the Greatest Eight, and did just that.
“It was really important for me that I won there,” she said in Singapore. “It’s not every day that I’m coming to a tournament and I have to win it to get somewhere, and then I actually won the whole thing.
“It was just a great week for me, and all happened so quickly. In two days I flew here.”
Cibulkova turned around a tough start in the round robin stage to stun 2014 finalist Simona Halep in straight sets, and overcame a 1/16 longshot of qualifying for the semifinals to knock out Svetlana Kuznetsova in the semis before overcoming World No.1 Angelique Kerber in the championship match.
“I cannot find the right word in English, but in the first match I played against Angelique, that gave me confidence that I can beat her,” she said of avenging her round robin loss in the final.
“My game is good enough to beat the World No.1. I was going into this final with these thoughts and I was feeling it from the first point until the last point.”
By beating the Australian Open and US Open champion, Cibulkova assured herself of a career-high ranking and a Top 5 finish for 2016, a place she sees as a launch pad for even greater success.
“Right now I don’t doubt myself anymore. I never doubted myself this year at all. I always had my coach to motivate me, to put the bigger goals for me. That was something I was dealing with; I never saw myself as such a great player, or a consistent player, somebody who could be Top 5.
“My coach said, ‘Domi, you had a great half of the season, but you’re able to have a great second half of the season. You just have to still stay focused and work hard. You can be Top 5 at the end of the year’.
“I really, really believed him for the first time in my life. I believed, ‘Okay, this is something I can do, I want to do.’
“I’m not saying I was coming to this tournament to win it, but when I was so close before the finals, I was convinced that I can beat Angie today.”
That new sense of determination paid off in Singapore, and it certainly helped her earn her the mantle of October’s WTA Player of the Month!
Final Results for October’s WTA Player Of The Month
1. Dominika Cibulkova (55%)
2. Agnieszka Radwanska (33%)
3. Angelique Kerber (12%)
2016 WTA Player of the Month Winners
January: Angelique Kerber
February: Carla Suárez Navarro
March: Victoria Azarenka
April: Angelique Kerber
May: Garbiñe Muguruza
June: Serena Williams
July: Simona Halep
August: Monica Puig
September: Petra Kvitova
How it works:
Finalists are selected by wtatennis.com
Winner is then determined by a fan vote on wtatennis.com
The third edition of the BNP Paribas WTA Finals Singapore presented by SC Global featured first-time champions in singles and doubles, a new year-end singles World No.1 in Angelique Kerber and the crowning of Sania Mirza as the top doubles player of the year. The 2016 Finals also set records off the court thanks to an unprecedented increase in social media engagement.
Dominika Cibulkova’s unexpected run to the final on her tournament debut was experienced by more fans than ever. Compared to the 2015 tournament, Facebook video views were up 571%, engagement on WTA-operated social media platforms increased by 247% and wtatennis.com referrals from social media improved by 167%.
The upsurge in engagement was driven by a ‘social first’ content strategy featuring on and off-court action, humorous player videos, match reporting, opinion editorials, innovative design and behind the scenes video on Facebook Live, Instagram Stories and Snapchat. The best-performing content pieces included the moment Cibulkova won title, a Facebook Live fan Q&A with Indian superstar Mirza, Svetlana Kuznetsova’s on-court haircut and live coverage of the iconic photoshoot, draw and gala dinner.
The increase in exposure was not just limited to web platforms with the 2016 Finals yielding a 4% increase in global TV household reach compared to 2015, thanks to increased exposure in Russia, Germany and Austria.
In addition to Cibulkova’s upset victory over Kerber, Olympic gold medalists Ekaterina Makarova and Elena Vesnina broke Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Lucie Safarova’s 18-match winning streak to lift the Martina Navratilova WTA Finals Doubles Trophy. Mirza finished as year-end World No.1 doubles player for a second consecutive season. Mirza has held the No.1 ranking for 83 consecutive weeks.
Melissa Pine, Vice-President of WTA Asia-Pacific and Tournament Director of the WTA Finals, said, “The Road to Singapore this year has been yet another exciting race to the finish line and the tennis action at the WTA Finals has truly reflected the top quality level of play among the greatest eight of 2016. We are thrilled with how the fans in Singapore and around the world have warmly embraced the event as well as shown their enthusiasm for women’s tennis.”
Petra Kvitova takes on Louisa Chirico in the first round of the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix.
ST. PETERSBURG, FL, USA – The WTA announced on Tuesday that the Taiwan Open will move to Taiwan’s capital, Taipei, from 2017. The Taiwan Open will take place starting January 30, 2017 on hard court at the 10,000-seat indoor stadium, the Taipei Arena.
Venus Williams won the inaugural event with Taiwan’s Chan sisters taking the doubles title. Williams’ victory at the inaugural 2016 Taiwan Open tournament in an exciting final against Japan’s Misaki Doi, was her 49th WTA title win. This year’s inaugural event, attended by almost 10,000 fans, let the world focus on Taiwan through global broadcast coverage and is set to become a major drawcard for Taiwan which has developed brilliant professional female tennis players like Su-Wei Hsieh, Chan Hao-Ching and Chan Yung-Jan.
The Taiwan Open attracts the support of the corporate sector, the media and fans, as well as creates an inspirational pathway for talented young national players who aspire to one day compete in world-class professional tennis and play in their homeland at the Taiwan Open.
Mayor of Taipei, Ko Wen-Je, stated, “On behalf of Taipei City Government, I am pleased to announce that Taiwan Open will be held in Taipei next year. We are committed to bringing the best events to our global city and the decision to move the event to Taipei demonstrates the city’s ability to attract the best international sport events. We look forward to working with the WTA and the tournament organisers to make this an event all of Taiwan can be proud of.”
The Taiwan Open offers USD 500,000 in prize money and is committed to attracting the world’s top tennis talent and to making this event one of the most prestigious WTA International tournaments on the women’s tennis global calendar. The move to Taipei will result in increased government and sponsorship investment and make the event accessible to a larger fan base.
“This is an exciting time for APG as we continue to support and expand the footprint of women’s tennis across Asia,” said Stephen Duckitt, Director – Tournaments, APG. “Tennis has grown considerably in this region over the past few years and we are looking forward to stage another world-class tennis event in Taiwan, and are proud to be hosted by the Taipei City Government next year.”