Women's Tennis WTA Tour 2023

[Makedonas 2,165]

On 2/9/2023 at 10:55 PM, Monzanator said:

Ons Jabeur has WD from Doha & Dubai so if there's any hope for some Arab support then it's your best guess now. Sherif probablt got WC line as the second best Muslim player on tour but Mattek-Sands and Zvonareva make no sense whatsoever. Muguruza has WD from Doha & Dubai anyway. Rybakina is out of Doha too. This Middle East swing is taking some hits but the more important Indian Wells/Miami double lies ahead after all.

In the end some of these WCs were wrong (I saw on Wikipedia so forgive me), however, they are still making Pliskova play qualifying. So ridiculous.

 

29 minutes ago, Monzanator said:

Maria Sakkari fell to 7-20 in WTA semi-finals by losing to Martic 6-3 3-6 4-6 @Makedonas

I saw the match, I don't think she played poorly, Martic was really good and served brilliantly.

 

Maria gets a lot of criticism for her SF record although last year she won 4 semifinals and lost 3, so I think she has overcome that now. Now she needs to fix the problem of finals, where she has 1 win and 6 losses. The only bad loss she had in a final was against Sherif in Parma. The St. Petersburg loss stung because she was up 5-2 (one break) in the third set but Kontaveit played well indoors at that time and was winning every tournament on the surface.

 

When she won in Rabat 2019, which people always make jokes about, she was not even expected to win and actually had a really tough draw (defending champion and top seed Mertens in QF, and then Konta in F, who went on to make the Rome F and Roland Garros SF that year).

 

I think if she keeps putting herself into these positions she will win more titles, but WTA has stupid rules that limits top 10 players from playing many 250s in a season, whereas on the ATP for example guys like Ruud and Sinner are able to play endless 250s and inflate their trophy cabinets...

[Makedonas 2,165]

Also I don't know if this is the right place to say it, but the Greek media is really shameful. Some Greek media outlets barely acknowledge the matches she wins, but then love to publicize the matches she loses and exaggerate them in some way.

 

She has 8 wins and 3 losses this year, but most people in Greece who are brainwashed by the media will think she has lost most of the matches she's played this year...it's really shameful!

 

Of course it is not a coincidence that they treat her this way when she is dating the Prime Minister's son.

[Monzanator 4,531]

Sakkari's biggest problem is quite obvious - she doesn't win any titles as a Top 10 player for well over a year. Rabat 250 is something that players outside of Top 100 have won in the last decade

 

Today's finals:

 

Abu Dhabi 500

Belinda Bencic def. Liudmila Samsonova 1-6 7-6(8) 6-4

 

Linz 250

Anastasia Potapova Def. Petra Martic 6-3 6-1

 

Up next the Middle East swing Doha and Dubai 1000 as the season kicks into the higher gear for good.

 

 

[hckošice 14,931]

Belinda

[Makedonas 2,165]

16 minutes ago, Monzanator said:

Sakkari's biggest problem is quite obvious - she doesn't win any titles as a Top 10 player for well over a year. Rabat 250 is something that players outside of Top 100 have won in the last decade

For many years she didn't schedule properly, she would almost never play 250s when she was ranked in the 20s and 30s, she scheduled like a top 10 player for years before she was one. Then once she suddenly became top 10 she had only one title to her name, and it became somewhat of a mental thing.

 

Had she played more 250s in 2019, 2020, 2021 etc., I wonder if she would've won more of them.

[Monzanator 4,531]

@MakedonasNo luck for Sakkari in Doha MD as she draws the in-form Zheng Qinwen in R1.

[Monzanator 4,531]

@MakedonasIt seems like Sakkari has realized she's going down with the Tom Hill ship or else?

 

https://tennisnews.gr/tennis-world/wta-tennis/item/54539-sakkari-tillstrom

[Makedonas 2,165]

On 2/13/2023 at 11:03 AM, Monzanator said:

@MakedonasNo luck for Sakkari in Doha MD as she draws the in-form Zheng Qinwen in R1.

She won in the end although Zheng hit the shot of the year in the second set.

 

11 hours ago, Monzanator said:

@MakedonasIt seems like Sakkari has realized she's going down with the Tom Hill ship or else?

 

https://tennisnews.gr/tennis-world/wta-tennis/item/54539-sakkari-tillstrom

The article just says that she added Tillstrom to her team in addition to Tom Hill, and that Hill will still be the main coach. I understand why she wants to keep him, he made her top 3 from a top 50 player and even though her results lately are more up and down, her highs are still very high and her level is generally much higher than it was in 2018 when they started working together for example.

[Makedonas 2,165]

Today in Doha, Azarenka wasted a 6-1 4-1 lead against Bencic (lost 6-1 6-7 4-6) and Ostapenko wasted a 5-2 lead in the third set against Pegula (lost 5-7)

[Monzanator 4,531]

Doha 500 semi-finals are set:

 

Iga Świątek vs Veronika Kudermetova

Maria Sakkari vs Jessica Pegula

 

Świątek had a bye in R1, destroyed Danielle Collins 60 61 in 52 mins in R2 and had Bencic walkover in the QF

 

Sakkari showing some strenght as she beat Garcia in final set TB few minutes ago...