Makedonas

Yes, she is 11th and Georgiadou is 15th! It's too bad they both can't make it to the Olympics with this current qualification format. I've said this before but I really wish Vougiouka would come out of retirement for Paris, she is younger than Velikaya and Zagunis who are both still top 10. We'd have a real shot at qualifying in the team event if she can get back into good shape. Our next best sabre fencer is Marina Paizi who is ranked 165...

Ruud withdrew due to injury.

Is that "top rank by year" or "rank at the end of each year" though?

Yeah, I noticed she retired in some of her last tournaments and also had Covid recently so I'm not too surprised. Sakkari has a good draw to make the QF, and now it's even better. Unfortunately Maria did not play well today in her first round match, so she will need to improve in order to capitalise on this draw. One step at a time though...

Thank you. I remember after Orleans, Greek sports sites were reporting what rankings Gkountoura and Georgiadou would move up to, but I didn't see anything this time around. Is there a way to check old rankings? I am curious as to what Gkountoura's best ranking was. I think she was in the top 10 at some point, maybe she was 8th or 9th? It looks like the FIE site only shows your ranking at the end of the year. Also, what about Vougiouka? She was 4th or 5th I believe? At Gkountoura's age I think she has a chance to become the highest ranked Greek fencer ever.

18 year old Greek Sapfo Sakellaridi won her second consecutive ITF futures title in Egypt. She played four finals in a row in the last 4 weeks in Egypt, losing the first two and winning the next two. She also won two doubles titles and reached the finals at the other two events. In singles, she is getting close to the top 500 now. Take a look at her service motion...

Gkountoura is currently ranked 12th, so now how much will she go up after this result?

You must be new to women's tennis. Final will be something random as always, like Anisimova - Mertens or something Yeah I think it will be hard to beat Medvedev for anyone. This isn't clay. I wasn't even sure that Djokovic would beat Medvedev. Personally I think if anyone else wins besides Medvedev, people will say there is an asterisk next to this slam and that they would never have beaten Djokovic if he was able to play.

Another easy draw for Berrettini. He is still ranked in the top 10 despite only having one top 10 win since 2019... Also never beaten a top 10 player at a major, and this time he can't face a top 10 opponent until at least the semifinals...

The four slams are run by the ITF.

I'm reading that two other players have now also been sent home. I wonder who. I guess we will find out eventually.

@Henry_Leon Mitoglou is injured? He hasn't played in a very long time.

Already two of them lost in qualifying

This makes me feel embarrassed that Maria lost to Raducanu in the US Open semifinals Is it bad that I don't want Rybakina to do well because she plays for Kazakhstan (despite having nothing to do with the country besides money)? Although the regular tour isn't as bad, at the Olympics I was very against her and didn't want her to win a medal.

Monica never received justice, her attacker was free in Germany. If I remember correctly he either never did jail time or spent very little time in jail.

I agree with everything you said. It's crazy that Australia (and many other places) don't allow any exceptions to being vaccinated, even if it is a strict quarantine or constant testing. By the way I've said it before and I'll say it again, I am vaccinated so I'm reminding people of that before they assume I am anti-vaccine when I am clearly not. Also Greece doesn't recognise Kosovo but when they played against us in Athens we let them in, actually all tourists from Kosovo are allowed in the country with their documents/passports even though we do not officially recognise them, and when they played against us it was called "Greece vs Kosovo Football Federation." So yeah, a lot of people have made accommodations as they should. Now I wish Voracova could play too...

It looks like have joined in on the celebrations.

Demonstration outside of the Serbian consulate in Thessaloniki. People showing their support for Djokovic.

https://sportsfeed.gr/i-ellada-chanei-kai-alla-meli-tis-olympiakis-omadas-poy-ginontai-athlitikoi-metanastes/ Ελεος...

Is this real? I can't find any other articles on it.

The new rumour is that she might take part in Survivor which has a big financial reward...in that case we will probably not see her defend her European title, and maybe never see her compete again... She has not posted anything on Instagram in a very long time also. She has really disappeared, and it's crazy that she hasn't even talked to her coach since Tokyo.

Naomi Osaka once again withdrawing in the middle of the tournament. This is becoming a pattern with her. I am sure she will be totally healthy during the Australian Open though...

On the topic of the Australian Open (if we're allowed to talk about this yet ), it looks like we will have the most Greeks ever at a Grand Slam tournament. We had 5 Greeks across all categories at the 2021 US Open, I think that might have been the previous record until now. As long as nobody withdraws, we have 7 Greeks so far and possibly 8 (if Petros Tsitsipas gets another doubles wildcard ). Stefanos Tsitsipas in men's main draw and Theodoros Mitsakos in boys' qualifying, Maria Sakkari in women's main draw, Valentini Grammatikopoulou and Despina Papamichail in women's qualifying, Michaela Laki in girls' main draw, and Dimitra Pavlou in girls' qualifying. At the 2014 US Open we had zero representatives in any category, so it's nice to see how much progress we have made since then. Also interesting to note that Pavlou is Sakkari's first cousin and this will be her first time at a Grand Slam.

Merry Christmas to those Orthodox Christians who celebrate! As a Greek Orthodox we do not celebrate today but on 25 December, same with some others like Bulgarians and Romanians for example, but others such as Serbians and Russians celebrate Christmas today.

Papachristou might be done. Her coach said that she took a break after the Olympics to think about her future and hasn't trained since and hasn't even let him know what her plans are. I wish she would at least compete at the 2022 European Championships as she is the defending champion in the triple jump. She would be 35 in Paris 2024 but already has a child and perhaps wants more children. She also missed the 2012 Olympics and didn't have any good valid jumps in Tokyo so I thought she'd want another Olympic chance since Rio was her only decent Olympic showing. We'll see though, maybe she'll be back in the outdoor season but it looks like she won't be in Belgrade.