Samantha Stosur up for her title defence at the US Open Championships – Tennis News
Aussie number one, Samantha Stosur, has been a regular member of the Top-10 rankings since the past two years. The 28-year-old veteran is having a downslide in her form this season but yet she is determined to defend her title
at the US Open Championships this year.
It was 2011 when Stosur came out from nowhere and beat all the odds to lift her maiden Grand Slam title at the Flushing Meadows in New York. Despite of being the ninth seed in the tournament draw, one was expecting her to become
the champion at such elite platform. It was her inconsistency which didn’t bring her in the lost of hot favourites for winning the 2011 US Open but she prove everyone wrong with her amazing skills and talent.
Stosur was riding a title drought throughout the 2011 WTA season, struggling to catch up some form in the game. Her losses in the finals of Rome Masters and Toronto Masters made her even desperate for a major breakthrough and she
delivered it during her US Open campaign. The Aussie veteran ousted the likes of Nadia Petrova, Maria Kirilenko, Vera Zvonareva and Angelique Kerber to reach the title match against the three-time former champion, Serena Williams. With the entire local crowd
supporting the home favourite Williams, Stosur came up with an eye-startling performance to win the final in straight sets, 6-2, 6-3.
With her first Grand Slam title in her bag, Stosur was expected to rise to form and clinch some more title before the end of the season. It went the other way round and she suffered back-to-back defeats from Kirilenko in the early
rounds of the successive tournaments to follow. She was the finalist in Osaka but lost to Marion Bartoli this time.
2012 WTA season didn’t bring much luck for the Australian number one and she kept struggling to perform well in the season-opening tournaments. Her first sublime run came at the Qatar Ladies Open when she reached the final of the
WTA event, only to be defeated once again. Stosur didn’t go past the semi-final round of any tournament to follow, falling out in the initial rounds of the events to sustain her slump of form.
She is still to win a title this year and it doesn’t seem that she can defend her Grand Slam title at the US Open. With Serena Williams riding her form of life, Maria Sharapova and Victoria Azarenka battling over the number one
spot and with the likes of Angelique Kerber and Agnieszka Radwanska aiming at their maiden Grand Slam title, it becomes even harder for Stosur to win this year’s US Open Championships.
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