Caroline Wozniacki: Part of the new breed of upcoming tennis stars
Caroline Wozniacki is a 20-year-old tennis player from Denmark. She is currently ranked number 1 in the WTA rankings and is part of a new breed of highly talented female tennis players. She has the interesting distinction of being the world’s number 1 ranked
player without having won a Grand Slam tournament in her career. Some say she is simply benefiting from the absence of the Venus sisters and Sharapova, but she has a lot of talent and with some more experience she might win a few major tournaments in the next
few years. This talented tennis player is one to watch out for in the future.
Wozniacki was born in 1990 and started to play tennis at a young age. She is the daughter of Polish immigrants who moved to Denmark early in their lives. She comes from a sporting family with her mother a former national volleyball player and her father
a former footballer who played professionally in Denmark. Her brother is a professional footballer at the moment. Caroline turned pro in 2005 and played several junior tournaments and won the Wimbledon Girl’s tournament in 2006. Later in 2006 she was a wildcard
entry into the senior Wimbledon tournament where she was beaten in the first round. During 2006, she also reached the quarterfinal of the Nordea Nordic Light Open in Sweden. She courted controversy when during the 2006 US Girl’s tournament she was disqualified
for verbally abusing a linesman.
At the end of 2006, Wozniacki won her first senior title at the ITF tournament in Turkey. 2007 rolled around and she played in numerous tournaments winning the $75,000 ITF tournament in Italy. She reached the semifinals of the AIG Open in Tokyo in October
of 2007. In 2008, she played in numerous tournaments again but failed to win at any of the Grand Slams. She reached the Round of 16 in the US Open, the third round of the French Open and also the third round of Wimbledon that year. She managed to win her very
first WTA tour title when she won the Nordic Light Open in Stockholm.
She played out 2009 the same way she had played 2008, not winning any Grand Slams but winning a few WTA tournaments along the way. She reached the Round of 16 at Wimbledon that year and managed to reach the final of the US Open which she lost. She got herself
into the WTA top ten for the first time and got the accolade of being the youngest player in the top ten. 2010 was a much better year for the young player and she won at Ponte Vedra Beach, Copenhagen, Montreal, New Haven, the US Open Summer Series, Tokyo and
Beijing. She is currently ranked number 1 in the world after having a great year.
She has her critics though; a lot of people feel that the only reason she is number 1 at the moment is because of injuries to the top female players in the world. Both Williams sisters are out for the whole year with injuries and Sharapova has recently been
sidelined also by injury. They also fail to see how someone who has not won a single Grand Slam could be the world’s number 1 female tennis player. She is also criticised for her playing style with a lot of people saying she has too much of a defensive style
and she forces other players to commit errors rather than winning outright points. She is trying to improve her game to make it more rounded these days.
The other thing about this talented Dane is that she is very good looking, photogenic and marketable. At the moment, she has sponsors falling over themselves trying to sign her. Her current sponsor list consists of e-boks, Sony Ericsson, Danske Invest, EuropAEISKE,
Adidas; for their Stella McCartney range and Babolat. It will be interesting to see how many sponsors Caroline is able to get if she actually wins a Grand Slam tournament.
The future looks very bright for the world number 1 at the moment and it will be interesting to see what she can achieve with some real challenges in the next season like the Williams sisters. She has great potential and will be around for a number of years
still, so it looks like we are going to be seeing a lot more of Wozniacki.
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