Left field
The Reuters global sports blog
‘Real deal’ Kvitova has talent to dominate
The season-ending WTA championships had many story lines. Could Maria Sharapova recover from her ankle injury to threaten at the year-end championships and become world number one again? Would one of the new major winners lift the trophy? Could Caroline Wozniacki continue her reign as world number one for a second straight year and win the end of season championships for the first time?
This is the first time the end of season championships have been held in Istanbul, Turkey. The crowds have been packed all week so it was an excellent choice of city. The stadium looked great and so did the green tennis court with the purple outer court. The tennis throughout was brilliant.
Unfortunately for Sharapova she had to pull out after her second round robin match against Li Na, thus ending her challenge of becoming world number one. This meant Wozniacki ended up finishing as world number one for the second year running without winning a major and having only won one match at the season-ending championships.
The good news for the event was the brilliant play of the major winners in these championships. Petra Kvitova, Li and Samantha Stosur all played well.
Kvitova is the real deal and has been unstoppable indoors this season. She ended up making the semi-finals by going undefeated in her group. In the semi-finals she played Stosur who beat Li in her last round robin match to qualify for the semi-finals. This was the match of the tournament with Stosur leading a set and a break before Kvitova rallied to win in three sets and make her first ever WTA championships final.
In the other semi-final it was Vera Zvonareva versus Victoria Azarenka. Azarenka dominated Zvonareva to make the finals.
Kvitova was the favourite to win and beat Azarenka in three sets to win her first ever WTA Championship. It has been an incredible year for Kvitova rising from outside the top 30 to finish the season at world number two.
Mercury rises on Wimbledon’s ‘Manic Monday’
A record crowd for a Wimbledon second Monday witnessed some breathtaking tennis while finding the time to take onboard plenty of liquids as temperatures soared in London.
The Williams sisters found the going tough and their so far impressive comebacks hit the buffers, while women’s number one Caroline Wozniacki’s route to a first grand slam title also came unstuck, but in the men’s draw there were no real dramas as the top four all hit their straps and made the quarters.
All eyes will be on team Nadal on Tuesday, after the world number one injured his foot during his epic win over Juan Martin Del Potro, especially British ones as the Spaniard could face home hope Andy Murray in the last four.
First up on Tuesday however are the women’s quarter-finals, and 2004 winner Maria Sharapova is the favourite to clinch her fourth grand slam crown, though among the other seven women in contention lurks German Sabine Lisicki, seeking to become the first wildcard to win the women’s title.
Finally a word on Bernard Tomic, the story so far of the men’s draw, who at 18 became the youngest man to reach the last eight since a certain former winner Boris Becker in 1986. Good omens if you like that sort of thing. The young Aussie already has plenty of fans and with his all-round play he’s set to win many more. He next faces Novak Djokovic.
Picture: The shadows of Jo-Wilfried Tsonga of France (L) and a ball boy are reflected onto a wall-covering on the court during the match against David Ferrer of Spain at the Wimbledon tennis championships in London June 27, 2011. REUTERS/Stefan Wermuth
Hit with Maria? A perk of the job for China’s leaders
As mayor of Beijing for most of the period running up to the 2008 Olympics and now Vice Premier of China with responsibility for financial and economic affairs, Wang Qishan has been a very busy man over the last few years.
He has, however, made time to indulge his passion for tennis and been highly influential in the growth of the China Open tournament, now one of the top events in women’s tennis with ambitions of becoming an Asian major.
Wang also likes to take to the court, and who can blame him when he is offered the chance to trade forehands with some of the best women in the professional game?
Maria Sharapova may have lost in the US Open, but she is still one of the best. And also, keep in mind she has recently (relatively to her career) gotten over a shoulder injury. I have been following her on Prince’s facebook page (www.facebook.com/official.prince.tennis ) and I think it’s great that she’s helping China’s Open get off to a good start.
A tale of two draws at Flushing Meadows
It has been a tale of two draws at the U.S. Open, with the men’s seeds advancing full steam ahead and the women’s field in disarray.
Eight of the top 16 women’s seeds have been given the boot at Flushing Meadows, while all 16 men have strolled forward — the first time men’s seeds have marched in lock step into the third round of a grand slam.
Even more of the top-rated women could be getting the dickens beaten out of them going deeper into the tournament, especially considering the dangers that returning champions Maria Sharapova and Kim Clijsters pose after layoffs that pushed them down the rankings list.
Was a time that the early rounds of the women’s tournament was a yawner until the second week. Not so in 2009.
Meanwhile, the top 10 in the often volatile men’s draw have barely felt a ripple of opposition. Going into Friday’s fifth day of play at Flushing Meadows not one had lost a set.
“That’s shocking,” fifth-seeded American Andy Roddick said after his second-round victory Thursday. “Not to lose one set, not even a set? Not a quick little break at 11:00 (a.m.) out on grandstand? That’s pretty surprising.”
Andy Murray of Briton gained the unexpected distinction of becoming the first man among the top 10 to drop a set when he took one misstep Friday in a 6-2 3-6 6-0 6-2 second-round victory over 87th-ranked Paul Capdeville of Chile.
With one final shriek, Sharapova is gone
It’s beyond me how anyone can deride women’s tennis as being dull. The relentless changing of the guard at the top of the world rankings and the general air of a free-for-all that the grand slams are cited as weak points in the game, when the sheer unpredictability of women’s tennis (compared to the men’s game) is precisely the reason it should be celebrated.
What many of the critics are really bemoaning, I suspect, is that Maria Sharapova didn’t go on to become the women’s Roger Federer. And while you couldn’t help be enthralled by her Wimbledon match against Gisela Dulko of Argentina on Wednesday, the Russian’s nailbiting defeat beneath the sunshine on centre-court is only going to bring more tut-tuts about the state of the game.
Which is a shame… because this was an absolute humdinger — the best match, involving men or women, on centre court so far this year.
When Sharapova won Wimbledon in 2004 at the age of just 17, the breathtaking power and accuracy with which she hit her shots seemed set to usher in a long spell as the game’s dominant force.
It didn’t happen that way. It was Justine Henin who established herself as the world number one and almost as soon as the Belgian had retired, Sharapova was struck by a shoulder injury that forced her out for nine months.
Sharapova is making her way back up the rankings but it’s been slow going. She went out at the quarter-final stage at Roland Garros and here she just made too many errors in her defeat by Dulko, who five years ago to the day beat Martina Navratilova at the same second round stage.
Justine Henin was in a league of her own. It was a very very sad day for tennis when she retired.
Roger Federer, and other crimes against fashion
Fashion models, with varying degrees of taste, have been strutting their stuff at Wimbledon this week — oh, and they play a spot of tennis too.
The courts seem to have become catwalks — Maria Sharapova was showing off a military-style jacket and Serena Williams wore a new mac (an odd choice since it was dry and even if it rained, Centre Court now has a roof).
There has been much discussion about the merits of women’s tennis. Michael Stich last week said the main point of it was sex appeal. Treating Wimbledon like London Fashion Week simply adds weight to the view that the ladies’ game is a fluffy waste of space, doesn’t it?
That said, it is not just the women who have caught the bug and perhaps we should be grateful that the players even bother about their appearance.
Fashion phobes like Andy Murray can be distracting by their scruffy outfits (untucked shirts in an array of colours better suited to the older man — hardly the look of a potential grand slam champion).
Luckily, either he or someone in his entourage has taken note, and on Tuesday a smarter-looking Murray will step on to Centre Court sporting a new range of clothing.
I don’t understand what the big deal is. Roger is known to always wear something unique every year. And a large number of people actually approved of what he was wearing. Maria Sharapova should probably concentrate more on her tennis than giving others fashion tips. She also wore something that resembled a tuxedo a couple years ago. But hey can we blame these tennis stars? If Nike were going to pay me millions of dollars to endorse their brand, I’d wear a kilt to play tennis!
No rain at Wimbledon but skating aplenty
Leading up to this year’s Wimbledon all the talk has been about the new roof on Centre Court and the blessed reality that rain-filled days would no longer scupper everyone’s plans to watch some tennis.
Yet no one bargained for ice.
Just ask Novak Djokovic and Julien Benneteau, who provided the Centre Court crowd with thrills aplenty as both suffered some horrific looking falls on the increasingly slidey surface.
Benneteau earned several well-deserved ovations for the rowdy fans after requiring treatment for some heroic dives, and Djokovic was full of praise for his opponent after the match.
“He was fighting a lot and he deserved to be supported today,” the Serb told British TV.
Andy Murray plays last on Centre tomorrow, and will need to get his skates on against American Robert Kendrick. A long match is all the top players need in the early stages of a grand slam.
The fans weren’t the only ones making plenty of noise.
Good article and I agree with most of it. The only disagreement is to the fitness part of it. Stosur is pretty fit, so is Azarenka and other players. They are not as great as Kvitova, not even close. Stosur has been fit most of her career and only this year won a Grand Slam and much with the help of Serena Williams. She doesn’t need to improve in that department at all, she has a great body, Kvitova, and a huge talent to play tennis! Absolutely love to watch her play! Go Petra!