A New Year, First Winners, And Already Some Questons

by Savannah

The 2013 tennis season began the end of December 2012. There were tournaments in Chennai, India, Doha, Qatar, Auckland, Shenzen, China and Brisbane, Australia.

Of these tournaments the biggest was in Brisbane. All but two of the WTA top ten competed there and the ones who weren't there, Li Na and Aga Radwanska, were headlining other tournaments. Maria Sharapova never took the court withdrawing with a collarbone injury that has never been adequately explained. This is how ESPN reported the story:

BRISBANE, Australia -- Maria Sharapova has injured her right collarbone and decided to withdraw from the Brisbane International as a precaution ahead of the Australian Open.

The French Open champion pulled out of the Brisbane tournament on Tuesday after feeling pain while practicing before her opening match.

"I still have quite a bit of time to prepare for Australia. I'm on the right track, been training really well, so I just don't want to jeopardize what I've gained in the offseason so far," the No. 2-ranked Sharapova said. "Just have to make a smart move here."

The 25-year-old Russian also withdrew from the Brisbane International last year because of injury but recovered quickly to reach the Australian Open final, where she lost in straight sets to Victoria Azarenka.

She said the latest injury also forced her to withdraw from a recent exhibition tournament in South Korea, but was "not at all" related to the right shoulder problem that has plagued her since 2008.

"I had a bit of inflammation in my collarbone, and I sent (scan results) to a doctor in New York and he told me I couldn't really do much overhead training for about a week," she said. "So to be fair, I haven't really given myself a chance to pretty much hit any serves or anything over my head ... So I just kind of ran out of time here."

Sharapova said she started practicing her serves again on Monday and it wasn't enough time to properly prepare for a tournament featuring eight of the top 10 women. The Australian Open starts Jan. 14 at Melbourne Park.

So in other words she never intended to play Brisbane but the WTA wanted to run with the story that eight of it's top ten was playing to open the season unlike the ATP. Whatever. Sharapova has been milking that shoulder injury for how long now? She can do no wrong.

Victoria Azarenka, the reigning WTA #1 ranked player did play up until the semifinal match. During her quarterfinal some of us on Twitter noticed that she was either grimacing in pain, about to cry, or both. it turned out that a rather aggressive pedicure had injured her toe and she withdrew from the semi where she would've faced someone named Serena Williams. Serena faced Anastasia Palyuchenkova in the final and had a rather easy time of it winning her first tournament of the year.



Serena did not have an easy path to the final despite her walkover. A young woman named Sloane Stephens gave her all she could handle in the quarter finals. I'll get to Sloane in a minute.
I watched my first ATP play during the Brisbane semifinals and final. Both times I watched Andy Murray, currently number three with a bullet (for those of you old enough to remember the old Billboard music rankings). I'm really not a fan of Murray's style of play but he does seem to be managing himself better on the court. He fell behind early in both matches and came back to win them both. His opponent in the Final was one Grigor Dimitrov, who is still predicted by the tennis media to become one of the top ranked players in the world. As we all know opinions are like assholes, everyone has one. Murray fans will say Murray woke up to come from 0-3 down to win the first set tiebreak to love and routinely take the second but you could see when Dimitrov began to tighten up and if I could see it you know Murray and his coach could.
I have nothing against Dimitrov but they hype is getting to be a bit much.



Meanwhile in Doha Nikolay Davydenko - you remember him - and Richard Gasquet played a final that is best described as a "pick 'em" match. Davydenko had shown any signs of life for so long you could say no one picked him to make this final. Gasquet has disappointed so many for so long even though he would have to be considered the favorite you could be excused for thinking that Davydenko had a chance here.



But Nikolay is still Nikolay and Gasquet took full advantage of that as you can see by the above photo. I didn't see one match at Qatar.

I also didn't see one ball struck at Chennai. Janko Tipsarevic won the title there. I'm sure his fans are happy.



Aga Radwanska won her first of the year in Auckland.


Li Na won the tournament in Shenzhen.




Newcomer of the Year



In November 2012 Laura Robson was named Newcomer of the Year for the WTA. I wrote here that the award seemed a little odd since Sloane Stephens was ranked higher than Robson and had shown more promise. Whatever. One of the more anticipated women's matches at Brisbane was between Serena Williams and the young woman she is mentoring, Sloane Stephens. I think Sloane should've paid more attention to how Serena plays her flesh and blood sister Venus Williams and not thought that her mentor would maybe cut her some slack. Whoever is across the net from Serena is a stranger and Serena treats them all the same. A lot was made of Sloane's aside to her coach that Serena's "come ons" were a little disrespectful. A joke or a rookie forgetting that her coach was mic'd. Neither woman made a big deal of it in the end but Serena doesn't forget. She especially won't forget how hard Sloane made her work. A more experienced Sloane would've had a real chance of an upset.

So it was with just as much anticipation among tennisheads that Sloane faced off against Laura Robson in the first round at Hobart.

Sloane didn't play with the same intensity that she did in Brisbane and Laura succeeded in pulling Sloane back to the junior level she still plays at. It looked as if Sloane would run away with the first set but she started spraying errors all over the place and hung on for 6-4.

The errors continued in the second set and a tiebreak decided it. Sloane won 7-6(4).

Sloane can't come out like a house on fire every single match but she has to try harder not to let her opponent bring her down to her level on the court. She knew she had to play her best against Serena and did. She needed to make sure she played her best against someone who, in some minds, is a better player than she is. That will come with more matches played on the main tour. She seems to have a great relationship with her new coach and that's a good thing. He is quietly reassuring and that is a good thing.

Idle Chit Chat

I had a moment on Twitter this week that surprised, but didn't surprise me sad to say.

Victoria Azarenka is friends with Stefan Kendal Gordy, known professionally as "Redfoo". Along with his uncle he is part of the group LMFAO. He is also a tennis fanatic. He also sponsors some ITF events.



What I don't understand is the hostility of Victoria's fans to her friendship with Stefan. It was bordering on the insane so I asked them what their problem was with him being friends with Azarenka. I still haven't gotten an answer. I've seen less vitriol directed towards him since then so maybe they're all dm'ing each other. Whatever.



When one of her fans decides to let us all in on why they're so hostile I'll be glad to post a response to their hating.

Last night Darren Rovell of ESPN (!), not one of the bought and paid for tennis journalists broke the news that Maria Sharapova is dating Grigor Dimitrov. Maria is older, and taller, so of course there were the predictable robbing the cradle comments.



Last year Grigor was rumored to be dating Serena who turned out to really be dating his then coach.



I'm assuming there's a Taylor Swift song about this.

End Notes

The ATP seems intent of enforcing a strict time rule this year. I don't have an issue with it as long as it's applied fairly and not just against one player.

Once again Andy Murray is stepping out front on this issue.

US Open champion and Olympic gold medallist Andy Murray has hit out at the ATP's subtle modification in the time rule.

The move - which came into force in the first week of the season - has been made in order to crack down on players who take too long between points, but has already sparked criticism among some top names.

The Association of Tennis Professionals, which runs the men's tour, have made the alteration to the rule so that umpires are given greater authority to enforce punishment.

Players who take too long preparing to serve, choosing the right ball and tug at their shorts incessantly are being targeted by the tennis authorities.

Several players have been at the receiving end of the new strict enforcement while British No.1 Murray believes the time allowed to players between points should be increased from 25 seconds to 30.

He said: "I like that there is a time violation in there. I think it'll be good, but I think starting off with 25 seconds at the beginning was a bit too much, because players just aren't used to playing at that pace."

The rule change mean an umpire can now warn a player that gets close to the limit. The penalty for a second and all subsequent violations of the 25-second rule by a server is an automatic fault, and a point penalty for the receiver.

Previously, the penalty for multiple violations was a point, although it was rarely invoked.

"It's the same rule, the 25-second rule. It's just giving the chair umpire a tool to enforce the rule," ATP supervisor Thomas Karlberg said.

"In the first week, we have been helping the guys during changeovers telling them you have to speed up to make it in time and before the match telling them what is going to happen. If they pass 25 seconds, they get hit."

The amended rule only applies to ATP World Tour and ATP Challenge Tour events, but its enforcement is likely to eventually spill over to the four Grand Slam tournaments which have a tougher, 20-second rule.

The change favors hard court play in my very humble opinion and will have a negative impact on clay court play which is supposed to be played at a slower pace. I guess some people want to even the playing field for United States and Australian trained players. I'll leave the British out of this one for now.

An Axis Failure

by Savannah

As you know I'm always railing about what the USTA needs to do so that it doesn't wind up like the LTA (Lawn Tennis Association). As if on cue David Ornstein of the BBC has posted this story about a young woman, born in the British city of Leeds, who is now playing for Australia.

Talented young tennis player Naiktha Bains has reluctantly turned her back on Great Britain after claiming the Lawn Tennis Association showed little interest in aiding her development.

The Leeds-born prospect emigrated to Brisbane shortly after winning a 2005 UK-wide talent search aged eight, and has since enjoyed prolific success.

Naiktha wanted to represent Britain and her family urged the LTA to take note, but by the time it reacted she was already being heavily supported in Australia.

The 13-year-old is now an Australian citizen and - despite also holding a British passport - she intends to remain faithful to her country of residence.

"I'm happy where I am," Naiktha, whose situation is a reversal of that which saw Laura Robson move to the UK aged six having been born in Melbourne, told BBC Sport.

"My coaches are really pleased with how I'm going at the moment and we'll stay with Australia if it keeps going this way."

Her father Gurnake added: "The plan was always for Naiktha to train in Australia and stay British for tennis, but we didn't get any support from the LTA.

"We pushed really hard to get them to look at her and would certainly have stayed loyal to Britain. They have since come forward but it's a bit late. At the moment, she's representing Australia and is Australian.

"Britain does still have a special place in our hearts but Australia would have to do something drastically wrong for anything to change. It's disappointing, but it's the LTA's loss."

Naiktha has won four Australian national titles at various age groups over the last 13 months and boasts a 100% record from six singles and doubles matches against British opponents.

She benefits from full scholarships with a private academy, the National Academy and a top Queensland school, and recently wowed leading coach Darren Cahill during a specially arranged training week in Las Vegas.
(...)
Naiktha first started hitting at the David Lloyd club in Leeds aged six, and was swiftly taken under the wing of then LTA coach Steve Mcloughlin.

The following year she emerged from a field of almost 10,000 to win the Ariel Tennis Ace competition, catching the eye of Boris Becker and Tim Henman in the final at Wimbledon.

That earned her a year's free coaching, but Naiktha only used about six months of it before the family uprooted to Australia for lifestyle and business reasons.

Although news of the move disappointed the Yorkshire LTA, Gurnake promised to stay in contact, provide updates on his daughter's progress and fly her over to play when possible.

He kept to his side of the bargain and she competed for Yorkshire in the County Cup during a trip back to the UK in 2006 - but it was not long before LTA correspondence dried up.

"Maybe they felt it was impractical, maybe they wanted to focus more on home-based players, maybe there was a change of staff or maybe it was just too hard," suggested Gurnake, an Indian-born property investor who moved to England aged two and has applied for Australian citizenship.

Before long, Naiktha was flourishing under the guidance of Gary Stickler, Pat Rafter's former coach and founder of the worldwide LifeTime tennis programme.

By 2008 Naiktha was turning heads in Australia, so Gurnake emailed Mcloughlin offering to fly her over for assessment, thus keeping her on the LTA's radar.

But after being told he would have to foot the bill for any court time and testing, which she was receiving at no cost in Australia, Gurnake decided against the visit and Mcloughlin suggested they instead enter her for the summer 2009 Junior Nationals.

As advised by Chris Peet, the LTA's talent performance manager for the North, Mcloughlin passed Naiktha's details to the governing body - yet heard nothing back for almost five months.

Mcloughlin urged it to review her case "as a matter of urgency" and head of talent Andrew Lewandowski eventually informed Gurnake that Naiktha would not be eligible to take part.

She had contravened LTA Rule 39, which states that entrants must not have competed in another country's national championships in the preceding 12 months.

"They were basically telling us 'we'd love to have you back here but you're going to have to stop playing Australian Nationals for a year'," Gurnake explained.

"She obviously can't do that when we're living here because she needs to compete at the highest level and it's bad for her development if she doesn't.

"We asked if they would make an exception given that we were trying to do something that may ultimately benefit British tennis, but they said 'no'."
(...)
The LTA finally made their move as Helen Reesby, national girls junior coach for 12-16 year olds, emailed Gurnake to compliment Naiktha on her progress and organise a meeting at the January 2011 Aegon Junior International in Bolton.

"We met with Helen and she explained the support options available," Gurnake commented. "I said 'wait a sec, do you not think you're a little bit too late? Naiktha's already getting all of that and more in Australia - and everything's free'.

"Helen replied, 'oh, is it?'. I said 'no disrespect but where have you been for the last three or four years?'. She didn't have a clue.

"She also said she was going to watch Naiktha play but I didn't see her courtside once. [Global management company] IMG were watching but the British lot were nowhere to be seen."
(...)

...the only way she can now represent Britain in an ITF team competition - such as Fed Cup or the Olympics - is if she avoids playing for Australia in the 36 months preceding that event.

"If the LTA had fulfilled what it said at the beginning and continued to keep an eye on her, without a shadow of a doubt she would have been playing WJTs for Britain," Gurnake insisted.

The 36-month rule applies solely for ITF team competitions, so Naiktha will always be free to pick which flag she plays under in tour events - but as things stand, Australia is her choice.

Mcloughlin admitted the "utopian dream" would be for Naiktha to evolve into a top player and decide to play with the letters 'GBR' next to her name, yet he conceded "it might be too late".

"Naiktha's case has shown us that some talents can fall off the radar," Mcloughlin added. "The LTA should be leaving no stone unturned to engage all foreign-based players and keep in regular contact.

"We need to adopt an umbrella approach - accept that many players will face different scenarios and make sure we are still covering them in one form or another."
(...)
The LTA told BBC Sport it does not comment on individual cases, and provided the following statement:

"The LTA is committed to supporting our most talented players irrespective of where they are based, and all British players are eligible to receive funding and support.

"The funding structure is the same for players training in Britain and abroad. Players based overseas are also invited to national player camps and can be selected for official trips and touring teams if they have the relevant results to support their selection."

I could go into what I think the reasons are that the LTA passed on this girl but took Laura Robson but I think the reasons are clear for those who care to see. I don't want to speculate about other potentially good players being passed over by the LTA since I'm based in the States and know very little about what they do unless something like this gets published by the BBC or other British press outlets.

That said I can easily see this happening in the United States. I know Patrick McEnroe is working hard to change the mentality of the tennis establishment here but if he's having such a hard time getting them to see the need for our youngsters to learn to play on clay I can only imagine the fight he'd have to get more Naiktha's on board. He has invested in Andrea Collarini though and we'll see how that works out in the years to come. It's the same with this girl. She is thirteen. I know I will keep looking out for her on the ITF circuit and see where she is at eighteen.

Tennis Chit Chat

by Savannah

I'm posting this about 10:30p East Coast USA time. I want to make sure my hypothesis holds. The above picture is from a day match during the WTA LA Women's Championship. There are a lot of empty seats. I can hear you all saying it's a day match in the hot sun. The fans must surely be on the grounds chowing down or browsing. Except that the stands look exactly the same at night. The face of the WTA, the Golden Girl, Maria Sharapova, has been playing in a near empty stadium as well. As one wit quipped there are ten people there for day matches and fifteen at night. Another fan made the statement that if Sharapova can't put butts in the seats the WTA has no chance of building the sport in Los Angeles.

Except that the empty seats have become the rule not the exception. During majors and combined events fans routinely head for the ATP match regardless of who is playing while the WTA matches are played in echo chambers. This is despite the fact that there are a lot of new players creating a buzz among fans.

The talk about more combined events has amped up again especially in light of this article posted online by the Globe & Mail regarding Tennis Canada's plans for the 2011 Rogers Cup.

Dramatic change is coming to Canada's premier tennis events in 2011, a year that will see the end of three decades of the men and women playing in separate weeks in the two cities.
(...)
Tennis Canada, mainly because of increased international pressure for more combined men's and women's tournaments, is going to have to squeeze its two marquee events into the same week. As a consequence, it has come up with what it is grandly calling the world's first ‘virtually-combined' tournament. The virtual refers to the melding of two events into one through the medium of television to produce images looking for all the world like those already coming from existing major men's and women's mixed tournaments in Miami and Madrid.

With its Stade Uniprix at Jarry Park in Montreal and Rexall Centre at York University in Toronto, Tennis Canada was not about to have the men and women play a customary combined event in one city. Both cities have been shown too much support for the events to be passed over every two years.

With Cincinnati securing the coveted date two weeks before the U.S. Open for its new mixed event in 2011, Canadian officials opted not to continue with two separate weeks if it meant stretching one of their tournaments back to four weeks before Flushing Meadows. That would have weakened player fields because it is too early for European players, the dominant force in tennis today, to come over to North America. So, Tennis Canada latched onto a date three weeks before the U.S. Open and hatched the idea of a ‘virtually-combined' tournament.
(...)
Tennis Canada officials are not eager to publicize it, but the men's tournament is significantly more marketable and popular than the women's. That is partly because of the greater strength of the men's fields from top to bottom, and partly because the men have proved much more dependable than the women in recent years at delivering the top stars for the Canadian events.

By splitting the draws, a men/women balance would be guaranteed in both cities every year, ending the underlying sense that the city featuring the men is getting the superior product. Montreal tournament director Eugene Lapierre is gung ho on the idea. “It would bring another dimension,” he said. “We'll have a winner in each place. It's like two 32-player draws.”

Whatever the distribution of players between cities, the image of one event, via television, will be reinforced whenever possible.

Please click the link above for the full article.

It's just my very humble opinion but the only ones who would allegedly benefit from this are the WTA head honchos and the players who will get to play in front of what I assume the bigwigs feel will be larger audiences. I use the word allegedly because as has been noted in this space if given the choice fans head to the ATP match. Unless one or both of those Williams Women are playing. While neither is the promotional face of the WTA in many fans minds they are the WTA, something no amount of magazine covers or cute dogs has been able to overcome.

Samantha Stosur
Both Venus Williams and Serena Williams are approaching the time in their careers where, much like Pete Sampras did as he got older, they're rightly focusing on the majors and not every single tour event. This will extend their careers and enhance their already shining legacy.

The burden is on the shoulders of the WTA to come up with a marketing plan for the tour and not just one player. I've said this a zillion times and will keep saying it until something is done to rectify the horrible situation that exists now. The WTA, by hitching it's star to the ATP, is not solving it's problems. Instead it's making them worse. The women's tour doesn't seem to know how to market Dinara Safina, the current number one, let alone Victoria Azarenka or Sorana Cirstea and doesn't seem to be interested in marketing the likes of Melanie Oudin or Sloane Stephens. Instead all the talk is about the girls in the 14-16 age group and younger, many of whom may not be able to transition to the pro tour. If they can't market the Safina's and Azarenka's of the world what the hell are they going to do with someone like Noppawan Lertcheewakarn who has eclipsed her fellow junior Laura Robson?


It's been interesting listening to the commentators struggle to put a positive spin on the abysmal level of tennis coming out of Los Angeles this week. When the star player has more double faults than aces what can be said? They say that the match last night between Maria Sharapova and Urszula Radwanska was only two hours long. It was the second time I've watched Radwanska the younger play. It's not as if Sharapova's game plan is a mystery. It's not as if what an opponent has to do to throw her off her game. U-Rad just seemed not to have the will to push her opponent out of her comfort zone. That was a quarter final match. Once it was finished I was ready to turn in for the night.

I'll just close this out by saying that the ATP event in Washington DC, Legg Mason, has had to cope with sell out crowds. I'm just saying.

End Note

My Twitter account is frelled. I may have to open a new one if the problems don't clear up soon.

Re the Crowd in Los Angeles: There are more people but the empty seats still outnumber them.

Thoughts on the Maria Sharapova vs Flavia Pennetta semi final in Los Angeles

The seeding held. Flavia, the number 10 seed, defeated the number 61 ranked player. There is nothing else to say.

Number 5

by Savannah

Not much to say is there? Venus let everyone know Centre Court is her house and no one, not even her sister, was going to move her out of it. Win number five. 'Nuff said.
Congratulations to both Venus and Serena for giving us a very entertaining and hard fought ladies final.

And it was so nice they did it twice. Congratulations to the Wimbledon Women's Doubles Champions for 2008.


There were other champions crowned today.

Laura Robson 2008 Girls Singles Champion

Nenad Zimonjic and Daniel Nestor 2008 Mens Doubles Champions