WTA Tour Championships preview
Eight of the year’s best players will this week be fighting for the chance to win the title at the WTA Tour Championships. In a field where defending champion – and Australian Open and Wimbledon winner – Serena Williams along with last year’s runner-up Venus Williams are absent through injury, we preview the chances of those who remain in the hunt for one final title of 2010.
Caroline Wozniacki – top seed, round-robin Maroon Group
The newly anointed world No. 1 arrives in Doha in the midst of a title-winning tear, having finished the tournament unbeaten in five of the past seven events she’s played. The problem for the bubbly 20-year-old is that one of the two losses she’s suffered since August was a fairly emphatic defeat at the hands of Vera Zvonareva in the US Open semi-finals.
That’s the one most casual tennis fans will remember as WTA tournaments pass by in a blur between the Grand Slams, and the one she needed to erase any doubts that when Wozniacki ascended to the top of the rankings, which she did at the China Open during October, she had earned the right to be there.
Winning at the season-ending championships, regarded as the next best thing to a major, therefore takes on an added importance for the Dane, and she’s been in such white-hot form lately that she has to be among the best chances of doing so in a Serena-less line-up.
Vera Zvonareva – second seed, round-robin White Group
It took Serena and Kim Clijsters respectively to end Zvonareva’s run at Wimbledon and then the US Open this year as the emotional Russian finished the majors as a dual Grand Slam runner-up.
They were performances that showed Zvonareva has a degree of steel and self-belief on the big stage that many observers may previously have doubted; her comeback from a set down against Clijsters to win their quarter-final at the All England Club and dominance of top seed Wozniacki in their US Open final serve as two prime examples.
Few would begrudge the Zvonareva a WTA Tour Championships title as some sort of consolation prize for those efforts, though it’s worth noting that her last four losses (two to Wozniacki, one to Clijsters and one to Elena Dementieva) came against players who will be present in Doha.
Kim Clijsters – third seed, round-robin White Group
Clijsters’ light schedule, as the mum-of-one balances a professional tennis career with family life, became even lighter this autumn as she withdrew from her one scheduled tournament between Flushing Meadows and Doha after surgical wounds from removing moles from her foot took longer than expected to heal.
That means the world No. 4 will make her first appearance at the WTA Championships since 2006 without having played a match since defending her US Open title in September. This though is also the player who took only three tournaments back after more than two years out of the game to win a Grand Slam title (at the 2009 US Open) so provided she’s fit, coming into the tournament cold shouldn’t matter too much for Clijsters.
Francesca Schiavone - fourth seed, round-robin Maroon Group
Even on the eve of the French Open final, few would have had Schiavone pencilled in as a Grand Slam champion, but that’s exactly what the 30-year-old now is and those 2000 ranking points played no small part in booking the veteran’s place in the Doha draw.
It’s probably fair to say the Italian remains a tougher prospect to face on clay than on the hard courts in Doha, but Schiavone is an astute tactician with an all-court game that has the potential to cause more than a few headaches on her day.
While Roland Garros saw Schiavone claim wins against Wozniacki and Dementieva (who retired from their semi-final with a leg injury), she has, however, had precious little success against any of the other Doha qualifiers away from Paris.
Samantha Stosur – fifth seed, round-robin Maroon Group
Stosur has entrenched herself in the top-10 this year and excelled during spring’s clay court swing, where she won the Charleston title and was runner-up at the French Open and in Stuttgart, but if you put a hard-fought late night win against Dementieva at the US Open aside, her form hasn’t been great since moving back onto the hard courts.
The Australian has big weapons with her serve and forehand, but questions have been raised about whether Stosur has the self-belief that she belongs among the tennis elite. A strong showing on her WTA Championship debut might just erase any remaining doubts, but two first-round losses to players ranked outside the top 40 and a failed title defence in Osaka in her last three tournaments don’t bode well for the world No. 7.
Jelena Jankovic – sixth seed, round-robin White Group
Jankovic arrives in Doha in perhaps the worst health and form of any of the contenders, her last match a 6-1, 6-2 defeat at the hands of 17-year-old, world No. 268 Zarina Diyas at the Kremlin Cup in Moscow last week.
The Serb has battled injury and illness since bowing out of Wimbledon with a back problem, and was under the weather in her loss against Diyas, but it’s hard to avoid the conclusion she’s running on empty right now and won’t be a threat here.
Elena Dementieva – seventh seed, round-robin Maroon group
A foot injury forced Dementieva to withdraw from her second-round match at the Luxembourg Open last week and the question that must be asked is: was it a precautionary measure taken with an eye on Doha or is the problem something that will hamper the 29-year-old’s chances here.
If fit, Dementieva’s recent form – she went down swinging against Stosur at Flushing Meadows, lost to Wozniacki in the final in Tokyo and was beaten in two tiebreak sets by a resurgent Ana Ivanovic in Beijing in her three previous tournaments – indicates the world No. 9 may have a say in deciding just who progresses past the round robin stage, and may even be one of those who does.
Victoria Azarenka – seventh seed, round-robin White Group
The final Doha qualifier, Azarenka has enjoyed a consistent season (the spring clay court swing aside) winning two titles (including sealing victory at the Kremlin Cup in Moscow on the weekend) and finishing runner-up in two other tournaments.
Still, a year in which she has been outshone by most of her rivals for the WTA Championships title at the majors probably provides a measure of the success the Belarusian can expect in Doha, and a second round-robin stage finish in as many years at the season-ending tournament seems the likeliest outcome.
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