The Decade's Best: Player #5- "Splitting Hairs"

Backspin's "Decade's Best" countdown of the final five of the Top 25 players of the 2000's begins today, with an additional edition arriving every day until the end of this year-long series on Sunday.

Unlike the past five-player portions of this list, all five of the remaining women are still active on the WTA tour, or at least they all WILL be come 2010, when they'll be simultaneously in action for the first season since 2007. Thus, each and every one of these all-time greats (they've combined for a total of thirty slam singles crowns in their careers, and filled twenty-nine of the forty slam champion slots this decade) still have intriguing chapters to write in their own personal histories.

In fact, the #5 player of the decade just penned a rather unexpectedly impressive one for herself just a few months ago:

#5 - Kim Clijsters, BEL


A debate about Kim Clijsters' career could fill a month of Backspins (and probably has, all told, come to think of it), but one thing that has never been in question in this space is the vastness and versatility of the Belgian's talent.

Personally, I've often had a testy opinion of the "trying-too-hard-to-be-liked" side of Clijsters' squeegeeing-courts-one-minute, gifting-bottles-of-champagne-the-next personality, which I've thought far too often took precedence over what should have been her athletic desire, as well as often providing a Teflon-like coating that shielded her from what should have been well-deserved criticism. Unlike when the likes of Mauresmo, Jankovic and Safina did it later, hardly a word in protest was uttered when Kim became the first to rise to the #1 ranking without ever having won a slam. Still, while I felt all that in my Backspinner bones, it was largely based, at least at the beginning, on her underperformance in slams, which I perceived as something of a waste of a huge loads of talent that should have produced far more moments in the spotlight. Her career was being sold short... by Clijsters herself. For the most part, if Justine Henin is acknowledged to have gotten every ounce of accomplishment out of her body, then Clijsters has achieved far less. The fact is, there was a pre-Backspin time when I debated whether or not I would shift my "most favored player" allegience to either Jelena Dokic or Clijsters in the wake of Jana Novotna's retirement a decade ago... needless to say, Dokic won out in the end.

From the start, it was obvious that Clijsters had it all, more than enough than was necessary to compete to become the top player of her generation. Powerful groundstrokes. Tremendous defensive abilities. Preternatural hustle. The latter of which was ultimately symbolized by the familiar image of her doing the splits while stretching to reach a shot that most players would have given up on. Her potential showed itself early, too. She reached the Round of 16 at Wimbledon in her first appearance in a slam main draw in '99. Unfortunately, that "other" side of Clijsters showed up that year, too. At the U.S. Open later that summer, the 16-year old Belgian led a 17-year old Serena Williams 5-3 in the 3rd set of their 3rd Round match. Clijsters lost, while Williams went on to win her first slam crown. The career-long die was pretty much cast for both there.

Even if it took far longer than it should have for Clijsters to finally become a grand slam champion, she was never too far off. No one had more SF-or-better Australian Open results than her four during the 2000's, but she only reached one final and never won the title (Serena, tied with four SF, won four Oz titles)... even as she was adopted as "Aussie Kim" by the Melbourne fans when she was engaged to Lleyton Hewitt. She reached two Roland Garros finals, losing in a classic to Jennifer Capriati in '01, then barely showing up against Justine Henin in the first-ever all-Belgian slam final in '03. At the U.S. Open in that same 2003 season, she was presented with a final opponent in Henin who'd barely advanced past the SF, fighting cramps and exhaustion that kept her up until nearly 3am... but somehow seemed less fresh than her countrywoman in the final the next night, losing 6-0/6-3. In all, she lost her first four slam singles finals from 2001-04.

To me, it all centered around that 2001 RG final against Capriati.

Her defeat at the hands of the American in a 12-10 3rd set served as the unfortunate launching point for the majority of a career whose trajectory was never as high as she should have desired it to be. She could have, and probably should have, won that first slam title in Paris a day after her eighteenth birthday. But when she lost, she realized it wasn't the "end of her world." She still wanted to win a slam, but understood that it didn't define her, and wasn't a be-all-to-end-all in her life. Who knows what might have happened had she won, of course (though I DID try to surmise the course of events in a "What If" special edition). As I've often said, Clijsters would be a great friend with such admirable qualities as those, but for an elite athlete with "all-timer" possibilities it's a wanting profile, and almost a template for a career underachiever in a sport where heart and desire are sometimes as or more important than natural talent (especially in clutch moments in big matches at the biggest tournaments in the world, precisely the places where Clijsters often came up short).

Comparing Clijsters to Henin, Kim usually came up on the wrong end of the equation, as well. Both debuted on the WTA tour at Antwerp in '99, with Clijsters losing in qualifying, then reaching the QF as a lucky loser. Henin won the title. Again, a die was cast. Clijsters, with Henin set to return to the tour in '10, trails her countrywoman 4-7 in head-to-head meetings in finals, is 0-3 in slam finals and 2-5 in slam matchups. In the final years before their twin retirements in the latter half of the decade, Clijsters dropped four of five matches against Henin from 2004-06. And while both were active during the 2000's, Clijsters claimed just a single slam title versus Henin's seven.

While such a rundown of Clijsters' "lack of achievement" is simply a prerequisite for me here, as I feel the FULL truth must be declared about her career, I don't want to denigrate or totally undersell her accomplishments, either. She's ranked in the Top 5 on this "Players of the Decade" list, after all, and it's not without reason.

In the eight seasons during which she had season-ending rankings during the 2000's, Clijsters finished in the Top 10 five times, and in the Top 20 two additional years. She first rose to #1 in August '03, and is one of only five players to simultaneously hold the top spot in both singles and doubles, which she did for three weeks that season. In fact, while she went slam-less in '03, she had a remarkable year. She won 90 singles matches and nine titles (including the defense of her '02 Season-Ending Championships title), and won a pair of slam crowns in Doubles with Ai Sugiyama at Roland Garros and Wimbledon. Thirty-four of her thirty-five career singles titles came during the decade, as did ten of her eleven doubles titles. In 2001, she teamed with Henin to claim Belgium's only Fed Cup championship.

Throughout her career, injuries have been a constant issue for Clijsters. In 2004, wrist surgery took her out for twenty weeks. By March '05, her ranking had dropped to #134. But, as was often the case, her time away allowed her to become healthy of mind and body, and she came back better than she'd left. In fact, it was her extended comeback from her wrist surgery that led into the North American summer that essentially saved her career from being a "whiff" during Clijsters I. For that brief multi-month period, the player many said was "too nice" to be a great champion found her killer instinct. She went on a 23-1 run on the hard courts, winning the U.S. Open Series, and then headed to Flushing Meadows and became the only woman to ever follow it up by winning the U.S. Open, as well. Her $2.2 million prize was record-breaking, but it was her 6-3/6-1 destruction of Mary Pierce in the final that was her most important accomplishment. In one fell swoop, she filled the gaping hole in her resume, backed up her otherwise-Hall of Fame worthy stats and made it impossible to continue to call her the best female player to have never won a grand slam title. By January of '06 she'd reclaimed the #1 ranking (extending her career time in the spot to nineteen weeks), becoming the first player to rise to #1 after being ranked outside the Top 100 twelve months earlier.

At the time, it was thought that this moment in New York would stoke her desire to rack up more of the slam crowns that had previously eluded her. But that isn't what happened. Having finally cleared the grand slam hurdle, she seemed satisfied. She didn't fall off the tennis map, but she didn't appear hungrier after her NYC experience and injuries continued to be an issue, as she didn't advance past the SF at a slam in any of the four events she entered in the sixteen months that followed her Open victory. In 2006, she couldn't attempt to defend her '05 crown after injuring her wrist in Montreal (right before the start of the Open, she'd recklessly -- insanely, really -- played on after injuring herself, only to fall again and hurt herself even worse). In mid-'07, she announced her retirement, walking away from the game at age 23 while ranked #4 (only #3 Steffi Graf had been ranked higher when she ended her career, until #1 Henin made a similar exit one season later).

I never thought she'd be back. I simply didn't think she'd want it enough, nor desire to step back into the day-to-day grind of the tour. In the two years that followed her retirement, the oft-tennis bridesmaid became a real-life bride, then a mother to daughter Jada, before burying her famous soccer-playing father. Then, something surprising happened. While preparing to play in a Wimbledon exhibition in early '09, she found the "bug" to compete once again, and soon made the commitment to return to action during the North American swing that summer.

Her success was swift and stunning.

In her KC II debut in Cincinnati, after two years away from the court, she won twelve of her first fifteen points in her opening match against Marion Bartoli and notched three Top 20 wins en route to the QF. She was just getting started. As a wild card with no official ranking, in just her third tournament back (and her first Open since winning in '05), she survived a few tense moments, defeating both Serena and Venus Williams along the way, and then smoothly worked her way into the final, where she took out Danish teenager Caroline Wozniacki in straight sets to get that long-overdue second slam crown and become the first mother to take a major title since Evonne Goolagong in 1980. After having missed the U.S. Open in '04, '05 and '07-'08 due to injuries and retirement, the 2009 title run ran her consecutive match streak at Flushing Meadows to fourteen, and 20-1 in the last twenty-one. Her last loss there this decade actually came in that '03 final against Henin.



The win pushed her ranking into the Top 20, and she finished the season at #18 despite playing just four tournaments.

Clijsters' U.S. Open win in 2005 certainly turned her previous major letdowns into something akin to semi-footnotes in her career, but it surely didn't erase them. Her '09 comeback victory, even in a tournament without Henin or with Maria Sharapova as a full-fledged force, clears away a little more of the residue from her inglorious past. But it's whatever happens during the remainder of Clijsters II that will still determine how her career as a whole is seen. If, ala Andre Agassi (well, almost, considering recent revelations), she collects at least two more majors during the "extra time" of her tennis lifespan, all the early hiccups will be smoothed out and forgotten by history... and, gulp, even a certain friendly neighborhood Backspinner.

Sure, a large part of me suspects that Clijsters might just be satiated once again, and her comeback has already experienced its zenith. But I guess that's just the Clijsters contrarian in me. In the end, she was one of the very best players of the 2000's, and her end-of-decade reminder of that little fact in New York will forever serve her well, allowing all those rough edges of memory that remain to be gradually softened over time.

Say one thing about her... she has good timing.

*BACKSPIN LINKS OF NOTE*
What If... Kim Clijsters Had Won Roland Garros '01?
The Best of Clijsters (2007)
Time Capsule: U.S. Open '03/'05 (Henin/Clijsters)
Killer Kim, Vol.II (U.S. Open '09)

TOMORROW: Player #4




1.
2.
3.
4.
5. Kim Clijsters, BEL
6. Jennifer Capriati, USA
7. Lindsay Davenport, USA
8. Amelie Mauresmo, FRA
9. Svetlana Kuznetsova, RUS
10. Cara Black, ZIM
11. Lisa Raymond, USA
12t. Virginia Ruano Pascual, ESP
12t. Paola Suarez, ARG
14. Rennae Stubbs, AUS
15. Elena Dementieva, RUS
16. Martina Hingis, SUI
17. Liezel Huber, RSA/USA
18. Mary Pierce, FRA
19. Dinara Safina, RUS
20. Daniela Hantuchova, SVK
21. Ana Ivanovic, SRB
22. Jelena Jankovic, SRB
23. Ai Sugiyama, JPN
24. Anastasia Myskina, RUS
25. Patty Schnyder, SUI
HONORABLE MENTION- Martina Navratilova, USA

Here are the remaining 4 players on the countdown list:

Justine Henin
Maria Sharapova
Serena Williams
Venus Williams



...the final three women who met the qualifications for the "Honor Roll" did so by way of their doubles accomplishments. The additions of Hsieh Su-Wei (year-end Top 10), Nuria Llagostera-Vives & Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez (year-end Top 10 and SEC title) bring the final number of honored women to 116.

*BACKSPIN'S 2000-09 HONOR ROLL, #27-116*
Nicole Arendt
Shinobu Asagoe
Victoria Azarenka
Sybille Bammer
Marion Bartoli
Daja Bedanova
Alona Bondarenko
Kateryna Bondarenko
Kristie Boogert
Elena Bovina
Severine Bremond-Beltrame
Els Callens
Anna Chakvetadze
Chan Yung-Jan
Chuang Chia-Jung
Dominika Cibulkova
Sorana Cirstea
Amanda Coetzer
Eleni Daniilidou
Nathalie Dechy
Casey Dellacqua
Mariaan de Swardt
Jelena Dokic
Silvia Farina Elia
Clarisa Fernandez
Tatiana Golovin
Anna-Lena Groenefeld
Carly Gullickson
Julie Halard-Decugis
Hsieh Su-Wei
Anke Huber
Janette Husarova
Kaia Kanepi
Sesil Karatantcheva
Vania King
Anna Kournikova
Michaella Krajicek
Lina Krasnoroutskaya
Li Na
Li Ting
Elena Likhovtseva
Sabine Lisicki
Nuria Llagostera-Vives
Petra Mandula
Marta Marrero
Conchita Martinez
Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez
Anabel Medina-Garrigues
Sania Mirza
Alicia Molik
Corina Morariu
Miriam Oremans
Melanie Oudin
Shahar Peer
Flavia Pennetta
Tatiana Perebiynis
Kveta Peschke
Nadia Petrova
Kimberly Po-Messerli
Agnieszka Radwanska
Anastasia Rodionova
Chanda Rubin
Lucie Safarova
Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario
Mara Santangelo
Barbara Schett
Francesca Schiavone
Monica Seles
Magui Serna
Antonella Serra-Zanetti
Meghann Shaughnessy
Anna Smashnova
Karolina Sprem
Katarina Srebnotnik
Samantha Stosur
Carla Suarez-Navarro
Sun Tiantian
Agnes Szavay
Tamarine Tanasugarn
Patricia Tarabini
Nathalie Tauziat
Nicole Vaidisova
Dominique van Roost
Elena Vesnina
Yanina Wickmayer
Caroline Wozniacki
Yan Zi
Zheng Jie
Fabiola Zuluaga
Vera Zvonareva

All for now.



"DECADE'S BEST" SERIES:
...Players of the 2000's: Nomination List, Australian Open 2000-09, Roland Garros 2000-09, Wimbledon 2000-09, U.S. Open 2000-09, Players #21-25, Players #16-20, Players #11-15, Players #6-10

Read more...

ITF Backspin (Wk.45)- Bagels, a Kiwi and Ukrainian Twins

The "Season-Ending" Championships are long since over. The Tournament of "Champions" is a thing of the past. The Italians might even be all washed up from their Fed Cup hangover.

But, until everyone packs up and heads Down Under this January, there's enough ITF action every week to fill a weekly update... and allow me to continue to talk about those on-the-move twin sisters from Ukraine.


ITF PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Varvara Lepchenko/USA
...American (by way of Russia) Lepchenko, 23, didn't just win the $50K challenger in Phoenix, Arizona (I say the state because I noticed that the scheduled event in that other Phoenix -- in Mauritius, who knew? -- was cancelled), she took it to recent ITF star Sacha Jones in the final, winning 6-0/6-0. In fact, she actually won the final eighteen games she played in the event after getting a 3rd set bagel in the SF against Rossana de los Rios, as well. Her other victim of note during the week was '08 U.S. Open junior champ Coco Vandeweghe.
=============================
RISER: Anna Lapushchenkova/RUS
...I've always hoped that the 23-year old Lapushchenkova would make a splash on the regular tour, just so people would have to learn to spell her name (or that she'd at least become part of a Lapushchenkova/Pavlyuchenkova doubles team that would test scoreboard lettering capacities all over the world). So far, no such luck. She did win a $50K event in Minsk this weekend, though, getting wins over the likes of youngsters Ksenia Pervak, Kristina Kucova, Vitalia Diatchenko and Lyudmyla Kichenok in the final (oops, there's one of those Ukrainian twins -- more on her and her sister in a moment).
=============================
SURPRISE: Lee Ye-Ra/KOR
...the 22-year old Korean swept both the singles and doubles titles at the $10K in Manila.
=============================
VETERANS: Rossana del los Rios/PAR & Mashona Washington/USA
...in Phoenix, DLR, as noted earlier, reached the SF after getting victories over Anastasia Pivovarova, Lauren Albanese and Olga Puchkova. Washington, apparently no longer tearing up hotel rooms, won the same event's doubles title with parter Sharon Fichman of Canada, defeating the team of Pelletier/Tatishvili in a 10-8 3rd set tie-breaker.
=============================
FRESH FACES: Lyudmyla & Nadiya Kichenok/UKR
...Alona & Kateryna no longer have the market cornered when it comes to Ukrainian tennis playing sisters. The 17-year old twins have been showing up more and more often in the latter stages of ITF events, and last week was no exception. Lyudmyla qualified and reached the Minsk singles final, losing in three sets to Lapushchenkova after notching wins over Melanie South, Vesna Manasieva, Tathiana Poutchek and Simona Halep. Nadiya fell in the second round of qualifying, but the duo teamed to win the doubles title, getting a 1st Round win over #1-seeded Poutcheck/Rodionova and then taking out Manasieva/Rodina in the final. I'm not sure which of the twins is the "one" and which one is the "two," but at the moment it looks like Lyudmila is the more advanced player.
=============================
DOWN: Alexandra Stevenson/USA
...yep, a decade after her shocking Wimbledon semifinal result and her subsequent dropping off the tennis map, Stevenson is still plugging away on the challenger circuit. For a bit, it looked like her run in Phoenix was going to be fruitful, as wins over Edina Gallovits and Rebecca Marino put her in the QF. But once there, she retired after playing just four games against Anna Tatishvili.
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JUNIOR STAR: Kyle McPhillips/USA
...the 15-year old American won the ITF junior event held at the Evert Academy in Boca Raton. She claimed the singles title without dropping a set, defeating Caitlyn Williams 6-2/6-0 in the final, and also won the doubles with Chanelle Van Nguyen.
=============================


1. $50K Phoenix Final - Lepchenko d. S.Jones
...6-0/6-0. Kiwi Jones' trip to the USA suddenly got ugly. Where's the hospitality, V?
=============================
2. $50K Minsk QF - Diatchenko d. Robson
...6-3/6-2. Russia's Diatchenko then went on to retire after just one game in the SF against Lapushchenkova. I'm sure Robson must have had something cheeky to say about that.
=============================
3. $50K Minsk Doubles Final - Kichenok/Kichenok d. Manasieva/Rodina
...6-3/7-6. Anyone else waiting for the first Kichenok/Kichenok vs. Bondarenko/Bondarenko match?
=============================


**2009 ITF TITLES - AMERICANS**
2...Irina Falconi
2...Laura Granville
2...Melanie Oudin
2...Shenay Perry
2...Abigail Spears
1...Jacqueline Cako
1...Beatrice Capra
1...Alexa Glatch
1...Kristie Haerim Ahn
1...Jamie Hampton
1...Macall Harkins
1...Lindsay Lee-Waters
1...VARVARA LEPCHENKO
1...Elizabeth Lumpkin
1...Alexandra Mueller
1...Alison Riske


All for now.



NEXT: The "Top 25 Players of the Decade - #1-5" and 2009 WTA Yearbook

Read more...

2009: A T-E-A-M Effort

Forty-four weeks of tennis action and it's come to this... trying to determine the "top" performer(s) in a year in which the player who spent the most time at #1 was most renowned for her no-shows and collapses in slams, while the actual year-end #1 player, who won two slams and the Season-Ending Championships, was, at best, largely on cruise control for the bulk of her all-or-nothing season, and whose '09 campaign will likely be more remembered for an on-court verbal assault borne of frustration, but one that's threatening under(and over)tones will live on for years thanks to moving-picture-magic.

In the end, neither the aforementioned Dinara Safina nor Serena Williams were able to close the door to a potential "wild card" candidate for this year's "Ms. Backspin" honors.

Largely, 2009 was the second consecutive season that was formed around the retirement of former #1 Justine Henin last year. In 2008, no player could rise to the forefront and declare without argument that she was the best player in the La Petit Taureau-less sport. This year, Serena WAS able to do that, but while she often unwisely chose to deride Safina's week in and week out (well, until the last month or so) commitment and success at all sorts of stops along the WTA road map, it is precisely that sort of consistent tour presence displayed by the Russian through which the overall success of the WTA and its players is SUPPOSED to be built upon. While many chose to overlook Henin's many positive contributions to the sport when she was atop it (but, oddly enough, recognized them once she was temporarily gone... go figure), no one ever questioned her commitment to the weekly grind of the game, nor her ability to always bring her best to the court whenever she stepped onto it. No matter how grand the tournament might have been.

Surely, Serena wants to be, and is, the best right now. But, sometimes, the BEST player still isn't the "Player of the Year."

A season ago, with no dominant single figure to be found, the dominating force that was the doubles team of Cara Black and Liezel Huber became the first "co-Ms. Backspin" winners in the history of this annual little important-in-only-one's-mind's-eye honor. This year, with Williams' '09 nagging negatives bumping uncomfortably up against her still-nearly-overwhelming positives, I've decided to go a different route for this award once again. Over the past season, comebacks have seemed to be contagious.

Well, apparently, so is honoring a team. Thus, the final "Ms. Backspin" rankings for 2009:

1. Italian Fed Cup Team



In a season in which the Dubai Debacle highlighted all the cracks in the framework of the WTA, as well as the lack of true support within the community of players for a fellow competitor wronged, it seems to me that the importance of teamwork should be honored with the awarding of this year's "Ms. Backspin." And what better show of teamwork was there in all of 2009 than that of the Fed Cup-winning Team Italia?

Led by the year-in, year-out dependability of veterans Flavia Pennetta and Francescia Schiavone, the Italians mowed through French and Russian teams, winners of five of the last six FC titles, to reach a third final in four years. There, they easily put down the Americans on red clay in front of a stadium-full of Italian fans to win a second crown in the last four years (with '06), rising above the fray to prove over the course of '09 that the excellence of a TEAM is quite often greater than the "quality" of its individual parts. While Pennetta has been a fine player over the years, she often lacked consistency. Now, though, she seems to be playing the best tennis of her life at almost age 28. Schiavone, 29, has always been a bigger star while playing under the Italian flag than when going it alone. In fact, only recently (including once late this season) has her long-time team leadership/success been joined by singles titles on the WTA tour. Together, though, along with their teammates, Pennetta and Schiavone have been golden.

This season, no single player was more deserving of being dubbed "Ms. Backspin" than the collective team of Italians who triumphed over all on the court in 2009.

Viva Italia!

2. Serena Williams, USA
3. Svetlana Kuznetsova, RUS
4. Serena Williams/Venus Williams, USA

Rarely has a player had as many superior results as Serena and NOT been a unanimous Player of the Year. Two singles slams, three doubles slams, an SEC title, the year-end #1 ranking. Quite impressive. But we almost EXPECT such things from Williams, and such is the burden of the most talented player of her generation. She almost has to top her own past exploits to be given her FULL due (at least this year), and that's quite a mountain to climb. The seeming re-invigoration of Kuznetsova might end up proving to be the most important development of the '09 season. Her Roland Garros title finally provided the proper follow-up to her '04 U.S. Open title. If she could play all of 2010 with the same confidence she showed in Europe during the spring, she might end up next season as the "surpising" last woman standing in what will be a crowded, ultra-competitive field. Serena and Venus might be the best women's doubles team ever, but since they're rarely healthy enough to play all that often their career numbers will never equal those of the likes of Navratilova/Shriver. Still, winning three slams in a single season, as they did this year, is sure to provide more than enough evidence of their prowess for future tennis generations.

5. Nuria Llagostera-Vives/Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez, ESP
6. Dinara Safina, RUS

After slowly building their rankings points and showing increased surface versatility all season long, the Spanish pair of NLV/MJMS ended their season on a high note, knocking off both Williams/Williams and Black/Huber to claim the SEC doubles title in Doha. Safina was ranked #1 for more weeks in '09 than any other player, won three titles and was the most consistent player on tour... except when it came to her final matches in slams. In the 4Q, after going down in flames once again at the U.S. Open, Safina finally seemed to collapse under the accumulated slings and arrows of the season, closing out her "career year" by retiring with a back injury after two games of action at the SEC.

7. Caroline Wozniacki, DEN
8. Kim Clijsters, BEL
9. U.S. Fed Cup Team
10. Elena Dementieva, RUS
11. Flavia Pennetta, ITA

Wozniacki was the top mover-and-shaker in the Top 10, and I'm not just talking about how her body was twitching when she collapsed on her back with cramps during the SEC, either. Charming, sometimes to a fault (in Luxembourg, at least), and with guts to spare, she participated in some of the most memorable matches all season, winning titles on three different surfaces, reaching the U.S. Open final, the SEC semifinals and finishing the season at #4. Clijsters' season essentially consisted of only three events played during the North American hard court season, but seeing that one included her second career U.S. Open title, she makes the list in a season in which no single player won more than three singles crowns. The Americans may not have won the Fed Cup title, but the Cinderella final run of Mary Joe Fernandez's "B"-team Bannerettes - from Oudin to Glatch to Huber) -- was one of the most unlikely stories in tennis this season. Dementieva began '09 as the hottest player on tour, but she suffered through several cold spells both before and after her U.S. Open Series win later in the season. Her slam results were mostly wanting, with the one notable exception being her SF result at Wimbledon, where she held a match point against eventual champ Serena. Pennetta's leading role on the FC-winning Italian Fed Cup team was one thing, but her individual singles results were pretty special, too, with her biggest highlight being when she became the first Italian woman to ever reach the Top 10.

12. Yanina Wickmayer, BEL
13. Cara Black/Liezel Huber, ZIM/USA
14. Victoria Azarenka, BLR
15. Venus Williams, USA
HM- Melanie Oudin, USA

Wickmayer won two titles and was a surprising U.S. Open semifinalist, but rather than celebrating her first-ever Top 20 finish in the rankings, she's deciding her next move in fighting a one year suspension for violating the "whereabouts" clause of the drug testing rules. Black & Huber ended '09 as the co-top ranked doubles players in the world, but their season's title total was cut in half from a season ago (from ten to five), and they failed to win either a slam or SEC crown. Azarekna opened 2009 by winning her first career title in Week 1, and soon reached the Top 10. Her three singles titles tied for the tour lead, but she was trumped in the long run by fellow Top 10er Wozniacki's big event results and the Dane's ability to maintain her cool while someone named Victoria around her was constantly losing her's. Venus has a good year, winning back-to-back titles on hard and clay courts and maintaining her #6 ranking despite failing to defend either her Wimbledon or SEC crowns. But, still, no SW19 singles plate means it was an "disappointing" year for her. Oudin burst onto the scene as an early Fed Cup star, then cut her teeth with a Wimbledon run that included an upset of Jankovic, leading into her star-of-the-tournament explosion at the U.S. Open thay made her a slam quarterfinalist/media darling/fan favorite at 17. Next year, though, she'll feel the weight of the pressure of expectation... will she still "believe?"

Of course, with Henin back in the fold in 2010, who knows what'll happen with this award a year from now. With some semblence of "normalcy" possibly returning to the tour, Serena might end up being 2010's "Ms. Backspin" even while garnering just a single slam title. La Petit Taureau could reclaim her throne. A healthy Maria Sharapova might go supernova for a second time. Heck, maybe even Clijsters will see the return of her countrywoman as a real challenge and finally become the one-is-never-enough, hungry champion that her talent has always silently urged her to be. Yeah, I'm not sure I believe that last one is even totally possible... but it should be a fun ride finding out and, gulp, maybe even being proven wrong.

Well, then again, let's not get TOO crazy.

=OTHER NOMINEES=
Marion Bartoli, FRA
Kimiko Date-Krumm, JPN
Jelena Dokic, AUS
Hsieh Su-Wei/Peng Shuai, TPE/CHN
Jelena Jankovic, SRB
Petra Kvitova, CZE
Sabine Lisicki, GER
Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez, ESP
Amelie Mauresmo, FRA
Shahar Peer, ISR
Aravane Rezai, FRA
Francesca Schiavone, ITA
Samantha Stosur, AUS
Vera Zvonareva, RUS

*"Ms. BACKSPIN" WINNERS*
2001 Jennifer Capriati / USA
2002 Serena Williams / USA
2003 Justine Henin-Hardenne / BEL
2004 Maria Sharapova / RUS
2005 Kim Clijsters / BEL
2006 Amelie Mauresmo / FRA
2007 Justine Henin / BEL
2008 Cara Black & Liezel Huber / ZIM-USA
2009 Italian Fed Cup Team

2009 Grand Slam Final Backspins:
Australian Open: The Theory of Serenativity
Roland Garros: Treating Those Two Impostors Just the Same
Wimbledon: The Power of One
U.S. Open: Killer Kim, Vol.II



*PERFORMANCES OF THE YEAR*
[Individuals]
1. Serena Williams wins Wimbledon, her eleventh career slam singles title, and third in the last four. It's her best slam run since "Serena Slam" in 2002-03. Overcoming a match point in the SF against Elena Dementieva, Serena proceeds to turn back the clock to SW19's early-2000's beginnings and defeat sister Venus in the final. Then, the sisters team to take the doubles crown.
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2. 17-year old American, world-#70 Melanie Oudin, arrives in New York sporting shoes with "Believe" on their sides, and then makes believers of the U.S. Open fans as she defeats a string of Russians -- including Maria Sharapova, Elena Dementieva and Nadia Petrova -- in three-set, come-from-behind fashion en route to a surprise QF result that makes her an instant star.
=============================
3. Without a main draw slam victory in six years, Australia's own (once again) Jelena Dokic pulls a stunning QF run out of her tennis bag, winning a series of three-set night matches in front of the Aussie fans and becoming the feel-good comeback story of the tournament.
=============================
4. Svetlana Kuznetsova and Dinara Safina rule the red clay. In Europe, the Russians meet three times in finals, the last time coming in the Roland Garros title match. Kuznetsova defeats Safina in Stuttgart, while Safina (who also reached a third consecutive pre-Paris final, winning in Madrid) gets the better of her countrywoman in Rome. At RG, Kuznetsova defeats world #2 Serena Williams, then knocks off #1 Safina in the final to complete the pair's red clay trilogy, claiming her first slam singles title since the 2004 U.S. Open.
=============================
5. Kim Clijsters, after two years away from the sport which included marriage, the birth of a daughter and the death of her father, charges through the draw at Flushing Meadows to claim her second U.S. Open title in just her third post-retirement tournament.
=============================
6. At the Season-Ending Championships, Caroline Wozniacki suffers through multiple attacks of cramps during Round Robin action in the Doha heat. Surviving a match point, she charges back to defeat Victoria Azarenka, then overcomes her own near-collapse against Vera Zvonareva in a match that she nearly won in straight sets. Two points from the victory, Wozniacki experiences a flat-on-her-back, flopping-like-a-carp moment when a full-body attack of cramps causes her to suddenly crumple to the court. She manages to get to here feet, serve out the match, then openly sob as she wobbles all the way to the net to shake the Russian's hand. A career-defining moment? Yeah, maybe.
=============================
7. Serena Williams wins the Australian Open, overcoming Svetlana Kuznetsova in a tight QF (the Russian served for the match) and then crushing Dinara Safina in the final. She and Venus also win the doubles.
=============================
8. Elena Dementieva opens her season with back-to-back titles in Auckland and Sydney, winning the latter with triumphs over the top two ranked players in the world, Serena Williams and Dinara Safina.
=============================
9. Serena Williams wins the Season-Ending Championships, defeating Venus twice (saving a match point against her in a Round Robin match) and wrapping up her second career year-end #1 ranking.
=============================
10. Melanie and Alexa save the world. In the Fed Cup 1st Round, Melanie Oudin is called upon to win a crucial singles match against Argentina's Betina Jozami in her her FC debut tie. She does, allowing the Americans, who'd been down 2-1, to win the deciding doubles match and advance. In the Fed Cup SF, in which Team USA fell behind the Czech Republic 2-1, Alexa Glatch goes 2-0 in singles to carry the U.S. team to the deciding doubles contest, where Liezel Huber and Bethanie Mattek-Sands overcome a match point to send the Americans to their first FC final since 2003.
=============================
11. Amelie Mauresmo finally wins a championship in Paris, at the annual indoor tournament held there. She notches three wins over Top 10 players to claim her first tour title since 2007.
=============================
12. Vera Zvonareva wins Indian Wells without dropping a set, and also claims the doubles title. Unfortunately, an ankle injury and its lingering effects would soon wreak havoc with the rest of her season.
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13. Marion Bartoli overcomes a match point against Jelena Jankovic in the QF, then defeats Venus Williams in the final to take the Stanford title.
=============================
14. After having been forced to retire with heat exhaustion from her match against Serena Williams at the Australian Open, Victoria Azarenka wins the rematch in the Miami final. Her defeat of #1-ranked Williams came just a week after she'd defeated #2 Safina.
=============================
15. One day before her thirty-ninth birthday, Kimiko Date-Krumm wins Seoul for her first WTA singles title since 1996, defeating the tournament's #1 seed, as well as its defending champion, and overcoming a match point in a 2nd Round contest.
=============================
HM- The oft-injured, hard-serving Sabine Lisicki wins Charleston on the strength of victories over Venus Williams and Caroline Wozniacki, either painfully teasing everyone with her untapped talent or giving a sneak preview of things to come.
=============================
HM- Elena Dementieva wins Toronto, defeating Maria Sharapova and Serena Williams, and takes the U.S. Open Series title.
=============================

[TEAMS]
1. Italy wins the Fed Cup title, sweeping through France, Russia and the United States by a combined 13-1 score
2. Nuria Llagostera-Vives & Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez win the SEC title, defeating both Williams/Williams and Black/Huber
3. Carly Gullickson teams with Travis Parrott to win a surprise U.S. Open Mixed Doubles title, deciding to play together at the last minute (after Parrott's partner Abigail Spears was injured). After surviving a match point in the 1st Round, the Americans end up defeating the #1, #2, #3 and #6 seeded teams en route to the title.

[JUNIORS]
1. Thailand's Noppawan Lertcheewakarn sweeps the Girls singles and doubles titles at Wimbledon
2. Barely a year after Laura Robson won the Wimbledon Girls title, fellow Brit Heather Watson wins the U.S. Open Girls championship

*MATCHES OF THE YEAR*
1. Wimbledon SF - S.Williams def. Dementieva
...6-7/7-5/8-6. Dementieva outhit Serena, but couldn't win the biggest points of the match. Trying to break Williams at 4-3 and get a shot to serve for the match in the 2nd set, the Russian failed to convert two break points. Serena held, then broke Dementieva for a 6-5 lead before serving out the set. Dementieva led 3-1 in the 3rd, and held a match point at 5-4. But when the Russian failed to do enough with a Williams second serve, Serena rushed the net and put away a day-saving volley before letting out a primal scream. Williams held for 5-5, then passed Dementieva at the net to hold for 6-6. After breaking to go up 7-6, Serena served out the match at 8-6 to win the longest SW19 SF in the Open era, then went on to defeat Venus in the final to claim her third Wimbledon singles championship.
=============================
2. SEC Round Robin - Wozniacki def. Zvonareva
...6-0/6-7/6-4. It was hard to beat the drama of this one. If it had taken place in a slam rather than the SEC, Wozniacki's fighting-through-cramps act of holding onto the match for dear life in the latter stages of the 3rd set would be re-played pretty much every year during a down moment in the tournament. As it was, the Dane turned what could have been a crushing blow, losing a 6-0/5-2 lead and failing to convert two match points at 6-5, into a career highlight display of guts and perseverence. Her on-court collapse under an attack of cramps while serving at 5-4, 30/30 in the final set was as awkward looking as it was painful to watch, but the strength of will the teenager showed in staring down the moment and prevailing should serve as an epiphany on which she could build her career into something special (think Justine Henin's overcoming of cramps that put her, too, flat on her back on the court in the Australian Open, a confidence-building moment she often referred back to as she climbed to the top of the sport a few years ago).
=============================
3. Charleston SF - Wozniacki def. Dementieva
...6-4/5-7/7-5. It wasn't a masterpierce by any means, but it WAS exciting, even if it was sometimes for all the wrong reasons. C-Woz grabbed a two-break up, 6-4/3-0 lead in the 2nd, taking advantage of the Russian's off-kilter start. She led 4-1, but after falling head-over-tea-kettle while trying to reach a ball in the short court, the teenager lost her compusure, and very nearly the match. Wozniacki failed to serve out the match at 5-2, was unable to convert three match points up 5-3, 40/love on Dementieva's serve, then couldn't serve things out again at 5-4. It didn't end there. She didn't put away a break point at 5-5, double-faulted on Dementeiva's set point at 5-6, then slammed her racket in a fit of anger she'd mostly left behind in her junior days. Between sets, Wozniacki weathered a tense visit from her father during the changeover, took a deep breath, then went back out and found a way to win the match. Dementieva's string of consecutive games won ended at six, and C-Woz finally put away the match on her fifth match point with a forehand down the line. Whew!
=============================
4. Rome SF - Safina def. V.Williams
...6-7/6-3/6-4. Here, we got a "Best & Worst" display from Safina. Safina fell behind a set and break against Williams in this match, but still managed to fight back to win the opening set and put herself in position to win in the 3rd. Up 5-4, 30/15 she threw in back-to-back double-faults, another DF after getting back to deuce, and missed a net cord setter down the line at another deuce. In between, Safina put together a brilliant series of points that kept her alive in the game. After saving four match points in the service game, she finally put Venus away when Williams' forehand sailed long. Ah, just another "run of the mill," 3:00 comeback victory by the most wonderful, horrible potential head case in the game.
=============================
5. SEC Round Robin - S.Williams def. V.Williams
...6-7/6-4/7-6. In the longest match of their head-to-head series, this nearly 3:00 contest included fourteen breaks of serve, a Venus comeback from two breaks down in the 3rd, a match point overcome by Serena at 6-5 and a slim one-point difference in total points for the match when all was said and done. It was the second time (Serena in Bangalore '08) in the series that one of the sisters had overcome match point against the other and gone on to win the match.
=============================
6. U.S. Open 3rd Rd. - Oudin def. Sharapova
...3-6/6-4/7-5. Sure, there were some ugly stats (cough, cough... 21 DF's by Sharapova) in this one, but the inherent drama of a 17-year old American battling against a former Open champ, who had incidentally made HER big career breakthrough by defeating a former champion at Wimbledon as a 17-year old in 2004, was as good as it gets. With no one knowing whether or not to truly "Believe" in Little MO, the Georgian made it okay for everyone to dream of bigger and better things. We like her. We really like her.
=============================
7. Australian Open 4th Rd. - Dokic def. Kleybanova
...7-5/5-7/8-6. Down a break at 3-1 in the 3rd, and love/30 on her own serve, Dokic pulled off one final miracle in Melbourne even while she was on the edge of exhaustion after having to go three sets each and every time she stepped onto the Laver Arena court. It wasn't easy for Dokic to get from where she used to be to somewhere closer to it than she's been in a long time, but she and everyone -- especially those of use who've been watching closely since her wild-and-rocky ride began a decade ago -- who reveled along with her in her long-overdue moment in the Australian sun wouldn't trade those two weeks in January for the world. Well, unless it would be for an even MORE successful run in Oz a few months from now.
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8. Dubai SF - V.Williams def. S.Williams
...6-1/2-6/7-6. With the stench of the Dubai Debacle still wafting through the WTA air, and with Tennis Channel deciding not to broadcast matches from the tournament, this was probably the most ignored, little reported, least important "big" match between the Sisters in... well, ever. Even those one-on-one contests in Compton probably drew an interested and excited crowd way back when.
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9. Australian Open Doubles QF - Hantuchova/Sugiyama def. Black/Huber
...7-6/6-3/12-10. The 3:00 match, in which the winners saved seven match points, provided a nice highlight for what would be Sugiyama's final season and an example of why Black & Huber, even while being ranked #1, didn't have nearly the same dominating aura in '09 as they had in '08.
=============================
10. Australian Open 1st Rd. - Jessica Moore def. Christina McHale
...1-6/6-3/9-7. One of the lost "classic" moments of 2009 was a match between a pair of slam wild cards. In the intense heat of Melbourne, 16-year American McHale, making her AO debut, seemed as if she was about to have a career day. She went up a set and break against the Aussie teenager, but then was suddenly attacked by a severe cramp in her left calf that left her unable to walk without assistance. Whether the cramp arrived as a result of the heat, her nerves, or a failure to properly hydrate (or some combination of all three), it was a moment that will serve as a lesson for the rest of her career. After having to be helped to her seat by tournament officials, she played on, and almost pulled off something remarkable. With the cramping both spreading and coming-and-going, McHale gutted things out, while Moore nearly became unhinged. The Aussie started overhitting and was distracted (as well as probably annoyed) by the American's plight that was turning their match into a tear-filled drama starring her opponent. She nearly gave away the match. Moore won the 2nd set, but McHale raced to a 3rd set lead and soon served for the match. But with McHale's cramping limiting her mobility, Moore finally began to take advantage of her sudden deficiencies and took it to her fellow teenager without a hint of mercy. Not effected by the heat, Moore eventually put away the match, but it's McHale's guts-but-no-tangible-glory moment that everyone will remember.
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11. Roland Garros 3rd Rd. - Azarenka def. Suarez-Navarro
...5-7/7-5/6-2. Azarenka's game was a mess as she fell behind CSN 7-5/4-1, and her squawking with herself and in-your-face gestures in the direction of the disapproving fans in the stands threatened to turn the proceedings into something akin to those Japanese legislature scuffles we sometimes see and shake our heads at. But Azarenka hit herself out of her funk, rescuing the 2nd set and extending the match to a second day because of impending darkness. The next day, she easily put away the Spaniard. Azarenka was so "out of her mind" at times in this one, she briefly turned me against her and her immature rumblings. The desire to win in her eyes eventually pulled me back to her side, but comparing her rough-edged wildness with Wozniacki's gutsy charm has now become my new pet project (count that as an early hint about one of my 2010 preview columns).
=============================
12. Roland Garros 3rd Rd. - S.Williams def. Martinez-Sanchez
...4-6/6-3/6-4. Ball hits MJMS's arm. MJMS refuses to admit it. Serena is PO'ed. Serena wins. Serena snidely calls MJMS a "cheater," as only she could or would dare. Tune in next time for another episode of "As the WTA World Turns."
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13. Wimbledon 1st Rd. - Ivanovic def. Hradecka
...5-7/6-2/8-6. It wasn't a great year for AnaIvo, but she did fight her way out of this one. Sure, to do it she had to first fail to serve out the match at 5-2 and 5-4 in the 3rd, survive two Hradecka match points, and only get a chance at her own match point after a net cord (one year after her "Kiss of Life" win over Dechy at SW19) bounced her way. But, hey, beggars can't be choosers, right?
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14. Eastbourne SF - Wozniacki def. Wozniak
...3-6/6-4/6-4. This season, C-Woz and A-Woz met up for a series of competitive, fun contests between two players who seemed genuinely tickled about how similar their last names are. This one stands out simply because of Wozniacki's sprawling-from-the-seat-of-her-pants shot from behind the baseline on a Wozniak smash that had seemed as if it would quickly end the point, and the great smiles all around about how much fun tennis can be. "Princess Charming" might have been born right here.
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15. Queen Chaos... missing it by THAT much
Roland Garros 4th Rd. - Cirstea def. Jankovic - 3-6/6-0/9-7
Stanford QF - Bartoli def. Jankovic - 3-6/7-6/6-3
Toronto QF - Kleybanova def. Jankovic - 6-7/7-6/6-2
U.S. Open 2nd Rd. - Shvedova def. Jankovic - 6-3/6-7/7-6
...JJ had a few moments in the spotlight in '09, but not nearly as many as she did in '08. Thus, I've gone through a full "Match of the Year" list with nary a single mention of Ms. Jankovic. So, here are a handful of moments to remember from Queen Chaos' season, though none of them are likely to be recalled fondly by her or her fans since her inability to win matches like these are precisely why she fell from #1 to #8 over the past year. Against Cirstea, Jankovic served at 5-4, 30/love in the 3rd and lost. In the Bartoli match, she served at 6-3/6-5 and held two match points before going down in defeat. In the Kleybanova meeting, JJ couldn't convert a MP in a 3:16 marathon. In the nearly 3:00 encounter with Shvedova, QC didn't pull out a victory despite having two match points. Hopefully, come the end of 2010, "Jankovician" will once again come to mean winning wild matches by unconventional circumstances while smiling all the way home.



**TEN RANKINGS NOTES OF NOTE**
Kim Clijsters finished at #18 after playing just four events. The next-highest ranked player with so few events was Alicia Molik, at #309 with four (all ITF challengers).
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After zero South Americans finished in the Top 50 in 2008, Argentine Gisela Dulko finished at #37 in 2009.
=============================
Nicole Vaidisova and Tamira Paszek both fell out of the Top 100, while Jelena Dokic, Kimiko Date-Krumm and Karolina Sprem all returned there.
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#49 Melanie Oudin, 18, is the youngest player in the Top 100. For the second straight year, 16-year old Michelle Larcher de Brito (#116) is the youngest player in the Top 200; while 39-year old Kimiko Date-Krumm (#82) is once again the oldest.

*YOUNGEST PLAYER - end of '09*
[Top 100]
18...Melanie Oudin, USA (born Sept.23, 1991)
18...Polona Hercog, SLO (born Jan.20, 1991)
18...Petra Martic, CRO (born Jan.19, 1991)
18...Chang Kai-Chen, TPE (born Jan.13, 1991)
19...Urszula Radwanska, POL (born Dec.7, 1990)
[#101-200]
16...Michelle Larcher de Brito, POR (born Jan.29, 1993)
18...Bojana Jovanovski, SRB (born Dec.31, 1991)
18...Kurumi Nara, JPN (born Dec.3, 1991)
18...Olivia Rogowska, AUS (born Jun.7, 1991)
18...Ksenia Pervak, RUS (born May 27, 1991)

*OLDEST PLAYER - end of '09*
[Top 100]
39...Kimiko Date-Krumm, JPN (born Sept.28, 1970)
35...Jill Craybas, USA (born Jul.4, 1974)
32...Tathiana Garbin, ITA (born Jun.3, 1977)
31...Patty Schnyder, SUI (born Dec.14, 1978)
30...Amelie Mauresmo, FRA (born Jul.5, 1979)
[#101-200]
36...Virginia Ruano Pascual, ESP (born Sept.21, 1973)
34...Rossana de los Rios, PAR (born Sept.16, 1975)
32...Tamarine Tanasugarn, THA (born May 24, 1977)
32...Lindsay Lee-Waters, USA (born Jun.28, 1977)
31...Lilia Osterloh, USA (born Jul.4, 1978)

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Eight of 2008's Top 10 finished there again in 2009. Only Maria Sharapova (#14) and Ana Ivanovic (#22) fell out. Of the current Top 10ers, Caroline Wozniacki (#12 to #4) and Victoria Azarenka (#15 to #7) were the two season-ending newcomers, both jumping eights spots over the past year.
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The Czech Republic is tied for second behind Russia with the most players in the Top 100 with seven. But the highest-ranked Maiden is just #39, meaning eighteen of the countries that have fewer Top 100 players than the Czech Republic have a player ranked higher than top-ranked Czech Iveta Benesova.
=============================
Agnes Szavay seemed to have a better, though inconsistent, 2009 season than the one she suffered through in 2008. She even won a singles title for the first time since 2007. Still, her year-end ranking fell from #28 to #40.
=============================
The Rich Stay Rich. In 2007, there were fifteen Russians in the Top 100. At the end of 2008, there were fifteen. At the end of 2009, there are... yep, you guessed it, STILL fifteen. And, unlike from 2007 to 2008, this year's fifteen Hordettes are the EXACT same fifteen players who finished in the Top 100 a season ago.
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Caroline Wozniacki and Francesca Schiavone's twenty-seven events are the most by any players ranked in the Top 20. Sara Errani's twenty-eight leads the Top 50. Patricia Mayr's thirty-two is the most in the Top 100.
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Only three of the players in the season-ending 2009 Top 50 ended 2008 ranked outside the Top 100 (previously-retired Kim Clijsters, Melinda Czink & Melanie Oudin). A year ago, twelve of the Top 50 players had risen from outside the Top 100.
=============================




[based on November 9 end-of-season WTA rankings]

*TOP 20 BY AGE*
[at of end of 2009]
29...Venus Williams
29...Francesca Schiavone
28...Serena Williams
28...Elena Dementieva
27...Flavia Pennetta
27...Li Na
27...Nadia Petrova
26...Virginie Razzano
26...Kim Clijsters
25...Samantha Stosur
25...Vera Zvonareva
25...Marion Bartoli
24...Jelena Jankovic
24...Svetlana Kuznetsova
23...Dinara Safina
22...Maria Sharapova
20...Agnieszka Radwanska
20...Victoria Azarenka
20...Yanina Wickmayer
19...Caroline Wozniacki

*TOP 20 BY NATION*
6...Russia (Safina, Dementieva, Zvonareva, Kuznetsova, Sharapova, Petrova)
2...Belgium (Clijsters, Wickmayer)
2...France (Bartoli, Razzano)
2...Italy (Pennetta, Schiavone)
2...United States (Williams, Williams)
1...Australia (Stosur)
1...Belarus (Azarenka)
1...China (Li)
1...Denmark (Wozniacki)
1...Poland (A.Radwanska)
1...Serbia (Jankovic)

*TOP 20 BY CAREER TITLES*
41...Venus Williams
35...Serena Williams
35...Kim Clijsters
20...Maria Sharapova
14...Elena Dementieva
12...Dinara Safina
12...Svetlana Kuznetsova
11...Jelena Jankovic
9...Vera Zvonareva
9...Nadia Petrova
8...Flavia Pennetta
6...Caroline Wozniacki
5...Marion Bartoli
4...Agnieszka Radwanska
3...Victoria Azarenka
2...Li Na
2...Yanina Wickmayer
2...Francesca Schiavone
2...Virginie Razzano
1...Samantha Stosur

*TOP 100 FACTS*
HIGHEST-RANKED PLAYER WITHOUT A CAREER WTA SINGLES TITLE: #24 Elena Vesnina
-----------------------------
*TOP 50 PLAYERS WITHOUT TITLES*
#29 Alisa Kleybanova
#30 Dominika Cibulkova
#34 Carla Suarez-Navarro
#41 Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova
#47 Peng Shuai
#49 Melanie Oudin
-----------------------------
NEW PLAYERS IN THE TOP 100 (since end of '08 season): 28
2008 newbies: 34
2007 newbies: 33
-----------------------------
HIGHEST-RANKED TOP 100 NEWBIES ('08 rank):
#18 Kim Clijsters (NR)
#38 Melinda Czink (#103)
#49 Melanie Oudin (#177)
#51 Alexandra Dulgheru (#385)
#56 Andrea Petkovic (#315)
#57 Jelena Dokic (#178)
-----------------------------
*SMALLEST 2008-to-2009 RANKING CHANGES IN TOP 100*
0...Venus Williams (6/6)
0...Agnieszka Radwanska (10/10)
0...Anastasia Rodionova (97/97)
1...Serena Williams (2/1)
1...Dinara Safina (3/2)
1...Elena Dementieva (4/5)
1...Flavia Pennetta (13/12)
1...Alona Bondarenko (32/33)
1...Aleksandra Wozniak (34/35)
1...Timea Bacsinszky (53/54)
1...Tsvetana Pironkova (98/99)
-----------------------------
*COMEBACK RANKINGS OF NOTE*
#18 Kim Clijsters, BEL
#57 Jelena Dokic, AUS
#58 Sania Mirza, IND
#82 Kimiko Date-Krumm, JPN
#91 Arantxa Parra-Santonja, ESP
#96 Karolina Sprem, CRO
#115 Shenay Perry, USA
#132 Sharon Fichman, CAN
#134 Sesil Karatantcheva, KAZ
#156 Julia Vakulenko, UKR
#161 Angela Haynes, USA
#225 Elena Bovina, RUS
#288 Mirjana Lucic, CRO
#309 Alicia Molik, AUS
-----------------------------
*NextGen RANKINGS OF NOTE*
#41 Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, RUS
#45 Magdalena Rybarikova, SVK
#46 Sorana Cirstea, ROU
#49 Melanie Oudin, USA
#51 Alexandra Dulgheru, ROU
#66 Urszula Radwanska, POL
#76 Stefanie Voegele, SUI
#92 Chang Kai-Chen, TPE
#116 Michelle Larcher de Brito, POR
#138 Ksenia Pervak, RUS
#154 Olivia Rogowska, AUS
#155 Madison Brengle, USA
#163 Lenka Wienerova, SVK
#178 Lauren Albanese, USA
#179 Ksenia Lykina, RUS
#210 Simona Halep, SLO
#213 Sacha Jones, NZL
#218 Christine McHale, USA
#244 Jessica Moore, AUS
#269 Sarah Gronert, GER
#297 Gabriela Paz, VEN
#336 Bianca Botto, PER
#353 Ajla Tomljanovic, SRB
#354 Coco Vandeweghe, USA
#376 Asia Muhammad, USA
#384 Noppawan Lertcheewakarn, THA
#413 Mallory Cecil, USA
#419 Laura Robson, GBR
#466 Elena Bogdan, ROU
#503 Ana Bogdan, ROU
#669 Veronica Cepede Royg, PAR
#700 Timea Babos, HUN
-----------------------------
*SISTERS*
#1 Serena Williams, #6 Venus Williams
#10 Agnieszka Radwanska, #66 Urszula Radwanska
#32 Kateryna Bondarenko, #33 Alona Bondarenko
#40 Agnes Szavay, #NR Blanka Szavay
#97 Anastasia Rodionova, #204 Arina Rodionova
#105 Kristina Kucova, #143 Zuzana Kucova
#169 Carly Gullickson, #NR Chelsey Gullickson
#548 Lyudmyla Kichenok, #597 Nadija Kichenok
#971 Jennifer Ren, #NR Jessica Ren
-----------------------------

*TOP 100 BY NATION*
(w/ # in 2008)
15...Russia (15)
6...Czech Republic (7)
6...France (11)
6...Germany (3)
6...Italy (6)
5...United States (5)
4...Romania (3)
4...Spain (5)
3...Belarus (2)
3...Belgium (1)
3...China (3)
3...Great Britain (1)
3...Slovak Republic (4)
3...Switzerland (2)
3...Ukraine (4)
2...Australia (2)
2...Austria (3)
2...Croatia (0)
2...Hungary (1)
2...Japan (1)
2...Poland (2)
2...Serbia (2)
2...Taiwan (Chinese Taipei) (2)
1...Argentina (1)
1...Bulgaria (1)
1...Canada (1)
1...Denmark (1)
1...Estonia (1)
1...India (1)
1...Israel (1)
1...Kazakhstan (2)
1...Latvia (0)
1...Slovenia (1)
1...Uzbekistan (1)
--
2008 TOP 100, NONE in 2009: New Zealand, Paraguay, Sweden, Thailand

*REGIONAL RANKINGS*
==RUSSIA==
#2 Dinara Safina
#3 Svetlana Kuznetsova
#5 Elena Dementieva
#9 Vera Zvonareva
#14 Maria Sharapova
#20 Nadia Petrova
#24 Elena Vesnina
#29 Alisa Kleybanova
#41 Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova
#44 Vera Dushevina
==NON-RUSSIAN EUROPE==
#4 Caroline Wozniacki, DEN
#7 Victoria Azarenka, BLR
#8 Jelena Jankovic, SRB
#10 Agnieszka Radwanska, POL
#11 Marion Bartoli, FRA
#12 Flavia Pennetta, ITA
#16 Yanina Wickmayer, BEL
#17 Francesca Schiavone, ITA
#18 Kim Clijsters, BEL
#19 Virginie Razzano, FRA
==ASIA/PACIFIC==
#13 Samantha Stosur, AUS
#15 Li Na, CHN
#36 Zheng Jie, CHN
#53 Yaroslava Shvedova, KAZ
#57 Jelena Dokic, AUS
#58 Sania Mirza, IND
#72 Ayumi Morita, JPN
#82 Kimiko Date-Krumm, JPN
#85 Akgul Amanmuradova, UZB
#92 Chang Kai-Chen, TPE
==SOUTH AMERICA==
#37 Gisela Dulko, ARG
#103 Rossana de los Rios, PAR
#191 Mariana Duque-Marino, COL
#198 Maria Fernanda Alvarez-Teran, BOL
#219 Catalina Castano, COL
#227 Jorgelina Cravero, ARG
#226 Maria Irigoyen, ARG
#242 Betina Jozami, ARG
#273 Maria Fernanda-Alves, BRA
#296 Marina Giral Lores, VEN
#297 Gabriela Paz, VEN
==NORTH AMERICA==
#1 Serena Williams, USA
#6 Venus Williams, USA
#35 Aleksandra Wozniak, CAN
#49 Melanie Oudin, USA
#77 Jill Craybas, USA
#79 Vania King, USA
#108 Stephanie Dubois, CAN
#114 Varvara Lepchenko, USA
#115 Shenay Perry, USA
#132 Sharon Fichman, CAN
[Mexico #1 - #630 Alejandra Granillo]
==AFRICA/MIDDLE EAST==
#31 Shahar Peer, ISR
#130 Chanelle Scheepers, RSA
#271 Marinne Giraud, MRI
#286 Selima Sfar, TUN
#313 Julia Glushko, ISR
#383 Natalie Grandin, RSA
#386 Keren Shlomo, ISR
#644 Chen Astrogo, ISR
#660 Christi Potgieter, RSA
#730 Chanel Simmonds, RSA

*REVOLUTION CHECKS*
==CHINA==
#15 Li Na
#36 Zheng Jie
#47 Peng Shuai
#153 Zhang Shuai
#184 Han Xinyun
#201 Lu Jingjing
#260 Yuan Meng
#266 Zhou Yi-Miao
#312 Yan Zi
#324 Sun Shengnan
==ROMANIA==
#46 Sorana Cirstea
#51 Alexandra Dulgheru
#73 Ioana-Raluca Olaru
#93 Edina Gallovits
#101 Monica Niculescu
#210 Simona Halep
#230 Irina Begu
#248 Agnes Szatmari
#306 Elora Dabija
#375 Laura Ioana Andrei
==GREAT BRITAIN==
#46 Sorana Cirstea
#88 Katie O'Brien
#89 Elena Baltacha
#100 Anne Keothavong
#159 Melanie South
#203 Naomi Cavaday
#252 Georgie Stoop
#332 Emily Webley-Smith
#341 Jade Curtis
#419 Laura Robson
#421 Amanda Carreras
==BELARUS==
#7 Victoria Azarenka
#52 Olga Govortsova
#98 Anastasiya Yakimova
#121 Darya Kustova
#168 Ekaterina Dzehalevich
#239 Iryna Kuryanovich
#263 Tatiana Poutchek
#328 Ksenia Milevskaya
#570 Ima Bohush
#596 Anna Orlik
==KAZAKHSTAN==
#53 Yaroslava Shvedova
#102 Galina Voskoboeva
#134 Sesil Karatantcheva
#206 Zarina Diyas

*RUSSIAN RESULTS ON THE WTA TOUR*
2001....0 titles, 3 RU, 6 SF
2002....6 titles, 8 RU, 11 SF
2003...11 titles, 4 RU, 20 SF
2004...15 titles, 18 RU, 30 SF
2005....9 titles, 8 RU, 36 SF
2006...19 titles, 15 RU, 30 SF
2007...12 titles, 15 RU, 26 SF
2008...18 titles, 20 RU, 21 SF
2009...13 titles, 13 RU, 19 SF

*BIGGEST RISES IN THE RANKINGS*
=end of '08 to end of '09=
[in 2009 Top 25]
UNRANKED: Kim Clijsters (NR to #18)
+54...Elena Vesnina (#78 to #24)
+53...Yanina Wickmayer (#69 to #16)
+40...Virginie Razzano (#59 to #19)
+39...Samantha Stosur (#52 to #13)
+31...Sabine Lisicki (#54 to #23)
+13...Francesca Schiavone (#30 to #17)
[2009 Top 26-50]
+128...Melanie Oudin (#177 to #49)
+65...Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez (#92 to #27)
+65...Melinda Czink (#103 to #38)
+48...Aravane Rezai (#74 to #26)
+44...Vera Dushevina (#88 to #44)
+31...Kateryna Bondarenko (#63 to #32)
+23...Lucie Safarova (#65 to #42)
[2009 Top 51-100]
+334...Alexandra Dulgheru (#385 to #51)
+268...Arantxa Parra-Santonja (#359 to #91)
+259...Andrea Petkovic (#315 to #56)
+204...Tatjana Malek (#272 to #68)
+172...Polona Hercog (#243 to #71)
+140...Chang Kai-Chen (#232 to #92)
+130...Petra Martic (#214 to #84)
+121...Jelena Dokic (#178 to #57)
+116...Kimiko Date-Krumm (#198 to #82)
+111...Anastasija Sevastova (#194 to #83)

*BIGGEST FALLS IN THE RANKINGS*
=end of '08 to end of '09=
[2008 Top 25]
-404...Katarina Srebotnik (#20 to #424)
-52...Anna Chakvetadze (#18 to #70)
-34...Alize Cornet (#16 to #50)
-29...Patty Schnyder (#14 to #43)
-17...Ana Ivanovic (#5 to #22)
[2008 Top 26-50]
RETIRED: Ai Sugiyama (#31)
DID NOT PLAY: Lindsay Davenport (#36)
-144...Nicole Vaidisova (#44 to #188)
-113...Bethanie Mattek-Sands (#39 to #152)
-76...Tamarine Tanasugarn (#35 to #111)
-54...Monica Niculescu (#47 to #101)
-34...Kaia Kanepi (#27 to #61)
-34...Maria Kirilenko (#29 to #63)
-29...Sybille Bammer (#26 to #55)
[2008 Top 51-100]
RETIRED: Nathalie Dechy (#72)
UNRANKED: Tatiana Perebiynis (#89)
-949...Casey Dellacqua (#55 to #1004)
-239...Hsieh Su-Wei (#79 to #318)
-172...Marina Erakovic (#60 to #232)
-125...Karin Knapp (#80 to #205)
-113...Tamira Paszek (#73 to #186)
-84...Marta Domachowska (#56 to #140)
-77...Nuria Llagostera-Vives (#70 to #147)

*SINGLES & DOUBLES*
(singles/doubles ranks)
=TOP 25 IN BOTH (8)=
Victoria Azarenka (#7/#15)
Daniela Hantuchova (#25/#13)
Nadia Petrova (#20/#16)
Francesca Schiavone (#17/#19)
Samantha Stosur (#13/#7)
Elena Vesnina (#24/#22)
Serena Williams (#1/#3)
Venus Williams (#6/#3)
=TOP 50 IN BOTH (+14)=
Iveta Benesova (#39/#34)
Alona Bondarenko (#33/#39)
Kateryna Bondarenko (#32/#41)
Sorana Cirstea (#46/#50)
Gisela Dulko (#37/#27)
Vera Dushevina (#44/#45)
Alisa Kleybanova (#29/#14)
Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez (#27/#6)
Anabel Medina-Garrigues (#28/#11)
Peng Shuai (#47/#12)
Flavia Pennetta (#12/#29)
Agnieszka Radwanska (#10/#46)
Patty Schnyder (#43/#31)
Zheng Jie (#36/#24)

*NATIONS WITH TOP 100 DOUBLES PLAYER, BUT NOT SINGLES*
GREECE: #98 Eleni Daniilidou
NETHERLANDS: #97 Michaella Krajicek
SOUTH AFRICA: #78 Natalie Grandin
TURKEY: #55 Ipek Senoglu
ZIMBABWE: #1 Cara Black

And, hopefully, I didn't flub up any numbers or figures after all that transcribing.

(crosses fingers)

NEXT WEEK: WTA Yearbook

All for now.



2009 SEASON REVIEW EDITIONS OF WTA BACKSPIN:
...Revolving Doors - 2010 WTA Guide Preview
...Regional Honors & '10 All-Intriguing Team and Market Tips
...Backspin Awards
...Ms. Backspin & Rankings Lists
...WTA Yearbook (next week)

Read more...

2009 WTA BSA's

Lists have always been a stock and trade component of WTA Backspin, and that's never more the case than with the annual Backspin Awards.

The final "Ms. Backspin" standings won't show up in this space for a day or two, but don't expect me to suspend myself for a year for such an instance of "unknown whereabouts." I know just where they are! As for what those pesky Belgians might do to me? Well, hopefully, they'll take into account my history with Justine rather than my off-and-on antagonism toward Kim when it comes to passing judgment... and, please, no one mention that I predicted Yanina to reach a slam SF a few months before she actually did it.

Anyway, here are 2009's "secondary" player and match lists (hopefully it'll tide the anti-doping zealouts over for a few days):

*RISERS*
1. Caroline Wozniacki, DEN
2. Flavia Pennetta, ITA
3. Vera Zvonareva, RUS
4. Samantha Stosur, AUS
5. Aravane Rezai, FRA
6. Marion Bartoli, FRA
7. Shahar Peer, ISR
8. Hsieh Su-Wei/Peng Shuai, TPE/CHN
9. Elena Vesnina, RUS
10. Li Na, CHN
11. Aleksandra Wozniak, CAN
12. Carla Suarez-Navarro, ESP
13. Vera Dushevina, RUS
14. Zheng Jie, CHN
15. Alisa Kleybanova, RUS
16. Kateryna Bondarenko, UKR
17. Yaroslava Shvedova, KAZ
18. Virginie Razzano, FRA
19. Gisela Dulko, ARG
20. Agnieszka Radwanska, POL
21. Timea Bacsinszky, SUI
22. Barbora Zahlavova-Strycova, CZE
23. Alla Kudryavtseva, RUS
24. Agnes Szavay, HUN
25. Lucie Safarova, CZE
HM- Jarmila Groth, AUS & Ioana-Raluca Olaru, ROU

*FRESH FACES*
1. Victoria Azarenka, BLR
2. Melanie Oudin, USA
3. Yanina Wickmayer, BEL
4. Sabine Lisicki, GER
5. Magdalena Rybarikova, SVK
6. Petra Kvitova, CZE
7. Alexandra Dulgheru, ROU
8. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, RUS
9. Sorana Cirstea, ROU
10. Ekaterina Makarova, RUS
11. Urszula Radwanska, POL
12. Alexa Glatch, USA
13. Chang Kai-Chen, TPE
14. Stefanie Voegele, SUI
15. Petra Martic, CRO
16. Julia Goerges, GER
17. Viktoriya Kutuzova, UKR
18. Evgeniya Rodina, RUS
19. Tatjana Malek, GER
20. Ayumi Morita, JPN
21. Laura Robson, GBR
22. Polona Hercog, SLO
23. Arantxa Rus, NED
24. Michelle Larcher de Brito, POR
25. Mallory Cecil, USA
HM- Mathilde Johansson, FRA & Vitalia Diatchenko, RUS

*UP-AND-COMERS*
1. Kristina Mladenovic, FRA
2. Noppawan Lertcheewakern, THA
3. Sloane Stephens, USA
4. Heather Watson, GBR
5. Madison Keys, USA
6. Richel Hogenkamp, NED
7. Ksenia Lykina, RUS
8. Daria Gavrilova, RUS
9. Zarina Diyas, KAZ
10. Gabriela Paz, VEN
11. Camila Silva, CHI
12. Yulia Putintseva, RUS
13. Irina Falconi, USA
14. Chelsey Gullickson, USA
15. Beatrice Capra, USA
16. Miyabi Inoue, JPN
17. Jessica Moore, AUS
18. Olivia Rogowska, AUS
19. Yana Buchina, RUS
20. Ajla Tomljanovic, CRO
21. Silvia Njiric, CRO
22. Zsofia Susanyi, HUN
23. Christina McHale, USA
24. Ester Goldfeld, USA
25. Maryna Zavenska, UKR
HM- Kurumi Nara, JPN & Anna Orlik, BLR

*SURPRISES*
1. American Fed Cup Team
2. Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez, ESP
3. Vania King, USA
4. Olga Govortsova, BLR
5. Andrea Petkovic, GER
6. Melinda Czink, HUN
7. Lucie Hradecka, CZE
8. Carly Gullickson, USA
9. Raquel Kops-Jones/Abigail Spears, USA
10. Zhang Shuai, CHN
11. Klaudia Jans/Alicja Rosolska, POL
12. Mariya Koryttseva, UKR
13. Lenka Wienerova, SVK
14. Anastasija Sevastova, LAT
15. Galina Voskoboeva, KAZ
16. Kirsten Flipkens, BEL
17. Alberta Brianti, ITA
18. Anastasiya Yakimova, BLR
19. Vesna Manasieva, RUS
20. Liga Dekmeijere, LAT
HM- Patricia Mayr, AUT & Ekaterina Dzehalevich, BLR

*VETERANS*
1. Serena Williams, USA
2. Nuria Llagostera-Vives/Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez, ESP
3. Kim Clijsters, BEL
4. Elena Dementieva, RUS
5. Flavia Pennetta, ITA
6. Venus Williams, USA
7. Cara Black/Liezel Huber, ZIM/USA
8. Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez, ESP
9. Francesca Schiavone, ITA
10. Nadia Petrova, RUS
11. Virginie Razzano, FRA
12. Amelie Mauresmo, FRA
13. Anabel Medina-Garrigues, ESP
14. Kimiko Date-Krumm, JPN
15. Jelena Dokic, AUS
16. Rennae Stubbs, AUS
17. Virginia Ruano Pascual/Anabel Medina-Garrigues, ESP
18. Bethanie Mattek-Sands/Nadia Petrova, USA/RUS
19. Roberta Vinci, ITA
20. Ai Sugiyama, JPN
21. Sybille Bammer, AUT
22. Lisa Raymond, USA
23. Tamarine Tanasugarn, THA
24. Iveta Benesova, CZE
25. Julie Ditty, USA
HM- Akgul Amanmuradova, UZB & Klara Zakopalova, CZE

*COMEBACK PLAYERS*
1. Kim Clijsters, BEL
2. Kimiko Date-Krumm, JPN
3. Jelena Dokic, AUS
4t. Maria Sharapova, RUS & Svetlana Kuznetsova, RUS
5. Shahar Peer, ISR
6. Sania Mirza, IND
7. Alicia Molik, AUS
8. Agnes Szavay, HUN
9. Yan Zi/Zheng Jie, CHN
10t. Angela Haynes, USA & Shenay Perry, USA
HM- Sharon Fichman, CAN & Zuzana Ondraskova, CZE

*DOUBLES TEAMS*
1. Serena Williams/Venus Williams, USA/USA
2. Nuria Llagostera-Vives/Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez, ESP/ESP
3. Cara Black/Liezel Huber, ZIM/USA
4. Hsieh Su-Wei/Peng Shuai, TPE/CHN
5. Virginia Ruano Pascual/Anabel Medina-Garrigues, ESP/ESP
6. Bethanie Mattek-Sands/Nadia Petrova, USA/RUS
7. Rennae Stubbs/Samantha Stosur, AUS/AUS
8. Nathalie Dechy/Mara Santangelo, FRA/ITA
9. Alisa Kleybanova & whoever she partners with, RUS/???
10. Svetlana Kuznetsova/Amelie Mauresmo, RUS/FRA
HM- Olga Govortsova/Tathiana Poutchek, UKR/BLR

*DOWN*
1. Ana Ivanovic, SRB
2. Anna Chakvetadze, RUS
3. Nicole Vaidisova, CZE
4. Russian Fed Cup Team
5. French Fed Cup Team
6. Dinara Safina, RUS (in slams)
7. Jelena Jankovic, SRB
8. Bethanie Mattek-Sands, USA
9. Katarina Srebotnik, SLO
10. Kveta Peschke, CZE
11. Alona Bondarenko/Kateryna Bondarenko, UKR
12. Patty Schnyder, SUI
13. Alize Cornet, FRA
14. Dominika Cibulkova, SVK (and that's even after reaching the Roland Garros SF!)
15. Tamira Paszek, AUT
16. Chinese Fed Cup Team
17. Alona Bondarenko, UKR
18. Casey Dellacqua, AUS
19. Marina Erakovic, NZL
20. Kaia Kanepi, EST (in slams)
HM- Maria Kirilenko, RUS & Anne Keothavong, GBR
EXTRA HM- the M.I.A. Tatiana Golovin, FRA

*FED CUP (WG) MVP's*
1. Flavia Pennetta, ITA
2. Francesca Schiavone, ITA
3. Melanie Oudin, USA
4. Alexa Glatch, USA
5. Liezel Huber, USA



=ITF STARS=

*CIRCUIT PLAYERS OF THE YEAR*
1. Barbora Zahlavova-Strycova, CZE
2. Lucie Hradecka, CZE
3. Sacha Jones, NZL
4. Jelena Dokic, AUS
5. Polona Hercog, SLO
6. Lucie Kriegmannova, CZE
7. Chan Yung-Jan, TPE
8. Maria Irigoyen, ARG
9. Alexandra Dulgheru, ROU
10. Valerie Tetreault, CAN
11. Mailen Auroux, ARG
12. Maria Elena Camerin, ITA
13. Karolina Sprem, CROM
14. Chanelle Scheepers, RSA
15. Regina Kulikova, RUS
HM- Julie Coin, FRA & Rossana de los Rios, PAR

*ITF MOVERS*
1. Petra Martic, CRO
2. Andrea Petkovic, GER
3. Tatjana Malek, GER
4t. Kristina Kucova, SVK & Zuzana Kucova, SVK
5. Sofia Arvidsson, SWE
6. Sarah Gronert, GER
7. Elena Baltacha, GBR
8. Evgeniya Rodina, RUS
9. Sophie Ferguson, AUS
10. Oksana Kalashnikova, GEO
HM- Yvonne Meusburger, AUT & Michaella Krajicek, NED

*ITF PLAYERS-TO-WATCH*
1. Ksenia Pervak, RUS
2. Timea Babos, HUN
3. Richel Hogenkamp, NED
4. Elena Bogdan, ROU
5. Gabriela Paz, VEN
6. Veronica Cepede Royg, PAR
7. Cristina Dinu, ROU
8. Chanel Simmonds, RSA
9. Sharon Fichman, CAN
10. Kristie Haerim Ahn, USA
HM- Zhou Yi-Miao, CHN & Daria Kuchmina, RUS

*ITF UP & COMERS*
1t. Lyudmyla Kichenok, UKR & Nadiya Kichenok, UKR
2. Bianca Botto, PER
3. Jacqueline Cako, USA
4. Elora Dabija, ROU
5. Ani Mijacika, CRO
HM- Caitlyn Williams, USA

*ITF SURPRISES*
1. Galina Fokina, RUS
2. Darya Kustova, BLR
3. Katie O'Brien, GBR
4. Estelle Guisard, FRA
5. Abigail Spears, USA
6. Eva Fernandez-Brugues, ESP
7. Violette Huck, FRA
8. Amanda Carreras, GBR
9. Sandra Zahlavova, CZE
10. Heidi El Tabakh, CAN
HM- Irini Georgatou, GRE

*ITF COMEBACKS*
1. Alicia Molik, AUS
2. Julia Vakulenko, UKR
3. Arantxa Parra-Santonja, ESP
4. Elena Bovina, RUS
5. Sesil Karatantcheva, KAZ
HM- Laura Granville, USA & Lilia Osterloh, USA

*ITF SEMI-DISAPPOINTMENT*
Julia Vakulenko, UKR... her season's total of ITF singles titles (3) equaled her number of in-match retirements this season. Of course, considering Vakulenko's medical history, that's a pretty good victory-to-injury ratio. Still, it was just under two years ago that she was at a career-high rank of #31. Now, largely because of her inability to stay on the court on a week-to-week basis, she's ranked #156.



*CHOKES OF THE YEAR*
1. The Dubai Debacle
...Shahar Peer was set to become the first Israeli woman to play in the WTA event in Dubai, until the government's eleventh hour decision to deny her a visa into the Muslim nation. Caught with its pants down and the door unlocked, the WTA and Peer's fellow players set new marks for the number of wrong turns taken over the course of a week. Rather than immediately pull the plug on the tournament (or at least threaten to do so) and assert at least a slight tinge of righteous indignation after being lied to by the Dubai government and touranment organizers about opening the borders, the tour instead chose to kowtow to the U.A.E. and the event's sponsors, rather than looking out for the personal and religious liberties of one of its own players. Citing how expensive it would be to pull up stakes at such a late date (as if those who denied the visa didn't have the same thought), a company line of "reason" parroted by no less than Venus Williams, the WTA went on with the tournament with, in the WTA's words, Peer's "blessing," as if she should have been the one walking to the front of the protest line ahead of the supposed "supporting body" that is the tour and its leadership. What about the players, you ask? Oh, as if they cared. It didn't individually effect them, so they did nothing. Hey, with one less top player, they had a better chance to win, right? No boycott, which would have been justifiably supported and applauded in all corners, was seriously considered. No outright expressions of even mild protest, overt or implied, took place during or after the event. Worse yet, after winning the title, Williams spoke with a straight face of how all the players "were with Peer," and Venus was later commended by certain tennis commentators for her "leadership" during the whole sorry situation. Around the sport, the likes of "upstanding" players such as Federer and Nadal remained mum, and Israeli player Dudi Sela actually seemed to blame Peer for the entire incident. For their part, both Tennis Channel (which decided to cancel plans to broadcast matches) and Andy Roddick (who withdrew from the upcoming ATP Dubai event in support of Peer) emerged with the ability to hold their heads up. Ultimately, the WTA fined the Dubai event, and the ka-jillionaires who run it, a "whopping" $300,000 and allocated prize money and ranking points to both Peer and her doubles partner, Anna-Lena Groenefeld. A day late, a dollar short and totally missing the point, not to mention the opportunity. The Dubai tournament is still on the 2010 schedule, once again with the "promise" that all players entered will be allowed to compete, and the one-time chief of the tour during the debacle, Larry Scott, has since resigned and taken over similar duties for the Pac-10 athletic conference. Perhaps, things will go smoothly when the WTA returns to Dubai next year, and Peer will make history one year later than planned. But none of that will alter the memory of how things went down in the heat of the moment, when support and the hint of a backbone, at the very least, were necessary... but disappointingly absent.
=============================
2. The F-Bombs Heard 'round the World
... Serving down 6-4/6-5 against Kim Clijsters in the U.S. Open semifinal, Serena Williams was charged with a foot fault on a second serve, giving the Belgian two match points. Serena then proceeded to verbally explode at the line judge who'd made the call, being caught on audio cursing her and threatening to shove a tennis ball down her throat. Once the line judge reported the comments to the chair umpire, Williams was charged with a game misconduct for abusive language. Having received a game misconduct earlier in the match after breaking a racket, the latest penalthy resulted, by rule, in a lost point. Being that it was on match point, Clijsters was declared the winner. Clijsters, who was bewildered about the situation as Williams shook her hand at the net, went on to win the title. Williams was fined for the incident, but, as of today, the "investigation" into whether or not a suspension is warrented is still "ongoing." Since the Open, Williams has gone on to win the Season-Ending Championships title and wrap up the year-end #1 ranking.
=============================
3. Fed Cup SF - Huber/Mattek-Sands (USA) def. Benesova/Peschke (CZE)
...2-6/7-6/6-1. In the final match in the tie, the Czechs led 6-2/5-2 and held a match point to become the first team from the Czech Republic to reach the FC final since then-unified Czechoslovakia reached the '88 final. On that MP, Kveta Peschke framed a wild shot. From there, the Czech team completely collapsed.
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4. U.S. Open 4th Rd. - Pennetta def. Zvonareva
...3-6/7-6/6-0. Under the lights, the Italian overcame six match points as the Russian suffered another of her painful-to-watch meltdowns.
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5. Then-#1 in Name Only?
... Formerly top-ranked Dinara Safina's late-round grand slam no-shows and collapses have grown to legendary status, but she'll be hard-pressed to "top" her loss in this year's semifinal to Venus Williams at Wimbledon. She was downed 6-1/6-0, then proceeded to seemingly lose much of the in-your-eye sentiments toward her critics the rest of the season. By the time the season had ended, she'd broken a WTA record as the #1 losing to the lowest-ranked player (#226) ever and finished the season at #2, with an injured back that threatens to delay the start of her 2010 campaign.
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6. Beijing 2nd Rd. - Zhang def. Safina
...7-5/7-6. This was the loss to the #226-ranked player, China's Zhang Shuai. It came after Safina had lost to Taiwanese teenager Chang Kai-Chen, ranked #132, one week earlier.
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7. Australian Open 4th Rd. - Safina def. Cornet
...6-2/2-6/7-6. Oh, there were better times for Safina, though. Here, Cornet held a 5-2 3rd set lead, twice served for the match and held two match points before the Russian pulled off one of her patented early-in-a-slam comebacks to grab the victory. Of course, this loss pretty much set the tone for Cornet's forgettable '09 season.
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8. "V" is Not for "Vaidisova: Champion"
... It's difficult to believe that Nicole Vaidisova was one swing of a racket away from having a match point to reach the Roland Garros final three seasons ago. This year, her downward spiral continued unabated, and she currently finds herself fighting just to stay in the Top 200 at #188. The former world #7's nadir, so far, is probably this year's loss to wild card Stacey Tan in the opening round of qualifying in Stanford. Of course, the way things are going for the disinterested Vaidisova, she may not be anywhere near rock bottom yet.
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9. Fed Cup SF - Italy def. Russia
...4-1. Tour domination does not always a Fed Cup champion make. Not in 2009, at least.
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10. Sydney 1st Rd. - S.Williams def. Stosur
...6-3/6-7/7-5. Stosur, still fighting against her inability to close out matches, opened her season with more of the same. She served for the match at 5-4, 40/love, but two double-fault-at-match point moments later, the Aussie was well on her way to another defeat.
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HM- U.S. Open 1st Rd. - K.Bondarenko def. Ivanovic
...2-6/6-3/7-6. AnaIvo led 6-2/3-1 and had a match point in the 3rd set tie-break, which she ultimately lost 9-7. One year after going out of the Open as the #1 seed in the 2nd Round, the Serb followed up with an even earlier defeat. Since winning Roland Garros in '08, she hasn't advanced past the Round of 16 in any slam, and she only played one more match after this one in the '09 season.
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*COMEBACKS OF THE YEAR*
1. Comeback Kim Clijsters
...rarely has a player's comeback been so successful so quickly. After two years away from the sport, Clijsters returned in Cincinnati. In her first match, against Marion Bartoli, she won twelve of the first fifteen points and took the match in straight sets, with a 28-5 advantage in winners. By the end of the summer, at the conclusion of just her third tournament, Clijsters was holding up the U.S. Open singles championship trophy for the second time in her career.
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2. Wimbledon SF - S.Williams def. Dementieva
...6-7/7-5/8-6. Dementieva took a 3-1 lead in the 3rd, and held a match point at 5-4. After failing to convert it, she spent the weekend watching Williams go on to win the SW19 title that could have been her's.
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3. The Story of the Tournament
... Jelena Dokic, former Wimbledon semifinalist and world #4, came into 2009 having not won a maid draw slam match since 2003. After getting into the Australian Open draw by winning the wild card tournament held by the Tennis Australia, just being able to play in her once-again-adopted home country seemed to be enough. Who could have guessed that she'd put on an under-the-lights, feel-good run in front of the Aussie fans that made her comeback the highlight of the tournament? Winning a series of three-setters, including one against eventual U.S. Open finalist Caroline Wozniacki, Dokic reached the QF before losing to Safina in three sets. Injury and fatigue sidelined her and/or effected her results for much of the season after that, but by early November she'd reached the finals of three straight ITF challengers (winning two, giving her three circuit titles on the year) and finished the season at #57.
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4. Roland Garros 3rd Rd. - Azarenka def. Suarez-Navarro
...5-7/7-5/6-2. The Belarusian trailed CSN 7-5/4-1 as darkness approached. Then, rallying her previously-wayward game by smacking every ball as hard as she could and battling the crowd as she demonstrably celebrated or bemoaned every good or bad shot she made, Azarenka tied the match at a set a piece and sent the contest to a second day. There, she quickly wrapped up the match. But her battle with her ability to control her temper, and the negative effect it has on her game, continues to this day.
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5. Fed Cup 1st Rd. - USA def. ARG 3-2; Oudin (USA) def. Jozami (ARG)
...2-6/6-1/6-2. Needing to get a win to force the tie into a decisive doubles match, the 17-year old game back from a set down, and 0-2 in the 3rd, in a gutsy display that foreshadowed her heroics at the U.S. Open later in the season.
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6. Australian Open QF - S.Williams def. Kuznetsova
...5-7/7-5/6-1. An angry Kuznetsova maintained afterward that the heat-related closing of the Laver Arena roof between the 1st and 2nd sets adversely affected her ability to win this match. Of course, it had nothing to do with her inablity to close out the match while serving at 7-5/5-4. Serena went on to win the title.
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7. The Story of the Rising Kimiko
... After twelve years of retirement, Japanese veteran Kimiko Date-Krumm returned to tennis in 2008 at age 37. At first, she limited herself to ITF events in Japan, in which she proved to be very succesful. This season, she left the borders of her home nation and began showing up in the draws of WTA tournaments. All she did was win her first non-Japan title since 1996 with a $75K championship, then go on to claim her first WTA tournament in thirteen years when she won in Seoul one day before her thirty-ninth birthday. In that event, she overcame a 6-4/5-2 deficit and a match point in the 2nd Round against Alisa Kleybanova. Date-Krumm ended the season at #82.
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8. The Princess of Charming Comebacks
....Caroline Wozniacki's stick-to-it-ness has resulted in quite a few three-set dramas over the last two seasons, enough to turn her into a Top 5 player and grand slam finalist. Maybe her two most memorable '09 comeback victories came against Elena Vesnina in Ponte Vedra Beach, then Victoria Azarenka at the Season-Ending Championships. In the heat of PVB, C-Woz roared back from a 2-4 3rd set hole, with Vesnina serving at 5-3 and holding a match in a five-deuce game, then holding two more on Wozniacki's serve (one of which the Dane won courtesy of a friendly net cord bounce). Wozniacki converted her own third match point, as the emotional Russian's own Shakespearean drama turned tragic on the other side of the net. In the SEC, a cramping C-Woz trailed 5-4 in the 3rd and was a match point down in the 2:38 match. As Azarenka was getting frustrated, breaking rackets and sailing a ball into the stands, Wozniacki was keeping her head. She won the match, and then another cramp-filled drama in the desert in her next outing against Vera Zvonareva en route to her first appereance in the SEC SF.
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9. The Tragic Heroine
... A one-time Top 100 player, Angela Haynes had pretty much dropped off the face of major tennis after her brother's death in a motorcycle accident in 2005. In Indian Wells, she re-introduced herself by taking advantage of a wild card into qualifying and reaching the main draw 3rd Round.
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10. $25K Darwin Final - Molik def. Peers
...6-3/6-4. After retiring a year earlier, Molik made a successful singles comeback on the ITF circuit in the latter portion of the season. In her first tournament back in Darwin, Australia, she evolved into a champion once again.
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11. Roland Garros 2nd Rd. - Sharapova def. Petrova
...6-2/1-6/8-6. Petrova led 4-2 and had a point for a 5-2 lead, but Sharapova used consistent serving and big point prowess to win here. In just her second tournament back after ten months off the tour with shoulder surgery, she reached the RG QF. The road was at times rocky for the Russian in the months that followed, but by the end of the season she appeared well on her way to becoming a top tier force on the tour once again in 2010.
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12. One Final Victory?
... When Amelie Mauresmo won the Paris Indoors title back in February, it seemed a great comeback moment. Finally claiming a title in the city where her Roland Garros fortunes had always been poor, she notched three wins over Top 10 players for her first title since 2007. At the time, it pushed her ranking back into the Top 20. Flashforward to the end of the season and that Paris title was the Frenchwoman's only singles title of the year, one which she ended early as she opening discussed the possibility of retirement. Ranked #21 to close out '09, this title might turn out to be Mauresmo's last.
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13. Roland Garros 1st Round - Diatchenko def. Johansson
...2-6/6-2/10-8. It's not often a young player saves seven match points in a grand slam contest and wins, but that's just what the young Hordette did in her RG debut this year.
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14. Fed Cup Asia/Oceania Round Robin - Stosur d. Tanasugarn
...4-6/7-5/6-0. Stosur opened her season with blown matches against Serena in Sydney, then Dementieva at the Australian Open. Somewhere along the way in '09, though, Stosur learned how to win. And this might be where it happened. She found herself down 6-4/5-2 here to Tanasugarn, but one break of the veteran's serve and Slingin' Sammy was on her way. She won the final eleven games of the match, then pulled a victory from the clutches of defeat against Tatjana Malek at Wimbledon (a year after blowing a big lead against Vaidisova there). By the end of the year, she'd finally won her first career tour singles title in Osaka and had the Top 10 in her sights. Coincidence? I don't think so. After all, rising confidence lifts all tennis boats.
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15. No Matter What Serena Says, Rome is a Big Tournament
...and Safina's win there this year, after coming back from a 2-5 deficit against Zheng Jie in the 3rd Round, then from a set and a break down against Venus in the SF, was more than impressive.
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*UPSETS OF THE YEAR*
1. Of Mary Joe and Women
...Mary Joe Fernandez's plans in her first season as the sole American Fed Cup coach rarely went awry. Playing with "B" rosters (in other words, without a Williams or a pregnant Lindsay Davenport) all year along, every move seemed to work. In the 1st Round, she picked FC newbie Melanie Oudin for the roster, then replaced an injured Bethanie Mattek-Sands with veteran/FC newbie Julie Ditty. Oudin won a huge tie-saving match after Team USA fell behind 1-2, then Ditty teamed with Liezel Huber to defeat the Argentines in doubles to win 3-2. Down 1-2 again against the Czechs in the SF, MJF's pick of Alexa Glatch for the roster proved to be the saving grace, as the Cali Girl went 2-0 in singles to push the tie to a decisive doubles match, where Huber & Mattek-Sands overcame match point to send the U.S. team to its first FC final since 2003. Her moves didn't result in a championship win over the Italians, but that was expected. The Cinderella run to the final surely wasn't, though.
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2. Safina's Autumn Fall
...Tokyo 2nd Rd. - #132 Chang d. #1 Safina 7-6/4-6/7-5; Beijing 2nd Rd. - #226 Zhang d. #1 Safina 7-5/7-6. The numbers say it all, really.
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3. U.S. Open 3rd Rd. - Oudin d. Sharapova
...3-6/6-4/7-5. Sure, Sharapova threw in 21 double-faults in this one. But this win, more than any other, erased the notion that the girl with "Believe" on her shoes was anything resembling a fluke at Flushing Meadows.
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4. Sometimes the Last Decision is the Best Decision
...Travis Parrott was supposed to play U.S. Open Mixed Doubles with Abigail Spears via a wild card entry into the draw. But when Spears had to pull out of the draw with a late injury, she suggested Parrott play with Carly Gullickson. The two had only played together for one set in WTT action several years before, but both were game to give it a try. After surviving a match point in the 1st Round, all the American pair did was defeat teams seeded #1, #2, #3 and #6 and win the first slam title in either's career.
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5. Australian Open 2nd Rd. - Suarez-Navarro def. V.Williams
...2-6/6-3/7-5. CSN has a history of upsetting name players at slams, and Venus was her victim in Melbourne. Williams led 4-1 in the 3rd, served at 5-3 and held a match point at 5-4, but the little Spanish "Annie," in her first AO main draw, broke the American in back-to-back games and then served out the match for her biggest win yet. It ended the Williams Sisters' 25-0 singles run versus the field in slams.
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6. Ponte Vedra Beach 1st Rd. - Keys def. Kleybanova
...7-5/6-4. American Madison Keys, an Evert Academy full-time resident, made her WTA debut at age 14 with a wild card into the main draw of PVB a memorable one by upsetting the Russian and averaging over 100-mph on her serve for the match.
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7. U.S. Open 2nd Rd. - Oudin def. Dementieva
...5-7/6-4/6-3. Dementieva came in as the U.S. Open Series champion.
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8. Wimbledon 3rd Rd. - Oudin def. Jankovic
...6-7/7-5/6-2. A qualifier at SW19, Oudin was just getting her slam batteries revved up at the All-England Club.
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9. A Future Wimbledon Final?
...Tokyo 2nd Rd. - Pavlyuchenkova def. V.Williams 7-6/7-5; Beijing 2nd Rd. - Pavlyuchenkova def. V.Williams 3-6/6-1/6-4. In back-to-back weeks, the Russian teenager made that potential "What If?" future meeting at SW19 not look all that bad, if I do say so myself.
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10. Luxembourg 2nd Rd. - Kremer def. Wozniacki
...5-7/0-5 ret. When Melanie Oudin was too ill to play, Kremer entered the draw of her home nation's event as a lucky loser. When Wozniacki realized she was too injured to be willing to risk playing her next match, less than a week before the SEC, she decided to gift the Luxembourg vet with a "free pass" to the next round. Naturally, after she'd talked about retiring with her father during a changeover, the action at such a point in the match set off alarm bells all over the anti-gambling establishement. Of course, suspecting that something "untoward" had taken place here would mean assuming that C-Woz was as stupid as a pocket-full of vibration suppressors, thinking that no one would notice anything odd taking place. It didn't. She's not. Now, back to that "investigation" into Serena's outburst in New York.
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HM- Luxembourg 2nd Rd. - Schnyder def. Clijsters
...6-4/3-6/7-6. Lost in all the Kremer/Wozniacki talk in the Luxembourg tournament was this match, in which Clijsters played her first event since the U.S. Open and promptly went out without much fanfare to a player having a less-than-mediocre season who she'd actually already beaten earlier in her '09 comeback outings before winning the Open. Don't think that this little result won't become a constant go-to for me in this space if KC's fortune's are anything less than slammin' in 2010.
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NEXT: Ms. Backspin (with "Performance of the Year" and "Match of the Year" winners, plus 2009 season-ending ranking lists)

All for now.



2009 SEASON REVIEW EDITIONS OF WTA BACKSPIN:
...Revolving Doors - 2010 WTA Guide Preview
...2009 Regional Honors & '10 All-Intriguing Team and Market Tips
...Backspin Awards
...Ms. Backspin (next)
...WTA Yearbook (next week)

Read more...

Wk.44- What Goes Around Comes Around

Going into this weekend, one might have said that it was a fait accompli that Italy was going to rule over the Americans in the Fed Cup final. And if you DID say it, then you'd have been 100% correct.



Oh, sure, there was that hint of a question before the action began on the red clay in Reggio Calabria. But just a hint, and that was only because the previous 2009 FC heroics performed by the likes of Melanie Oudin, Alexa Glatch and Liezel Huber just to get the "B" American team to the final left you resistent to TOTALLY writing off the U.S. team. But, really? Red clay. An Italian crowd. Flavia Pennetta and Francesca Schiavone, two of the most dependable FC participants around. There was very little wriggle room for the Americans, and it didn't take very long for that wriggle to be wrung out.

Pennetta opened things with an easy 6-3/6-1 win over Glatch. Then, Oudin grabbed a 4-2 lead on Schiavone in Saturday's second match... but then the rains came pouring down. MAYBE Oudin could have sparked some continuation of Team USA's Cinderella story if the weather had held, but maybe not. As it was, Schiavone came back and assumed control of the match, winning 7-6/6-2 and pretty much sealing the deal for Italy's second Fed Cup championship. On Sunday, Pennetta put down a still-game Oudin, though she only briefly showed any of the same spirit that made her such a star earlier earlier this year in FC and U.S. Open action, by a 7-5/6-2 score and everything was over except for the final victory laps. After skipping the fourth singles match, the four players yet to play in the tie got some action, with Italy's Sara Errani and Roberta Vinci downing Huber and Vania King 4-6/6-3/11-9 to wrap up a 4-0 win for Team Italia.

Hey, what goes around, comes around. Before this, Italy sported a 0-9 Fed Cup mark against the Americans.

And to the victors go the spoils... which include not only the Fed Cup title, but also a certain "honor" that'll be presented in this space later this week.

*WEEK 44 CHAMPIONS*

TOURNAMENT OF CHAMPIONS (Bali,INA/hard indoor)
S: Aravane Rezai def. Marion Bartoli 7-5, ret.

FED CUP FINAL (Reggio Calabria,ITA/red clay)
S: Italy def. United States 4-0


PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Flavia Pennetta/ITA
...in a season in which she became the first-ever Italian woman to reach the Top 10, earned a new array of fans with her North American success and gutsy win over Vera Zvonareva under the lights at the U.S. Open, it just wouldn't have been right had Pennetta not ended 2009 by leading the Italian team to its second-ever Fed Cup title. And speaking of "going around coming around," while Pennetta was a leading member of Italy's previous FC championship team in '06, she didn't exactly contribute as much as she'd have liked in that tie. That 3-2 win over Belgium came despite Pennetta's 0-1 singles mark, as she lost to Justine Henin. So, this time around, the victory lap must have been that much sweeter.
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RISER: Aravane Rezai/FRA
...sure, the TOC didn't necessarily NEED to happen, but Rezai is surely glad that it did. With her '09 title in Strasbourg serving to punch her ticket to Bali, she proceeded to add a second career tour crown with an undefeated week in Indonesia, getting round robin wins over Sabine Lisicki and Melinda Czink, a SF victory against Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez, and a retirement from fellow Pastry Marion Bartoli after one set in the final.
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SURPRISES: Jennifer & Jessica Ren/GBR
...the Sunderland $10K challenger has presented us with yet another pair of doubles-playing siblings, as Sheffield, Yorkshire, England's Ren sisters -- 15-year old Jessica and 16-year old Jennifer -- won the doubles (Timea Babos took the singles). Hmmm, on the heels of the Tournament of Champions, maybe the WTA should set up some type of Doubles Challenge event where all the other tennis sisters can battle each other in a round robin format for the right to face Venus & Serena in a winner-take-all championship match. A flight of fancy, yes... but no less needless an addition to the calendar than the "season-ending" TOC, I'd posit.
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VETERANS: Kimiko Date-Krumm/JPN & Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez/ESP
...when 2009 began, a then 38-year old Date-Krumm was something of an ITF curiosity, toiling away in a lower-level comeback that no one really expected much to come from. Fast forward to now, and the 39-year old has a WTA singles tournament in her pocket and was in Bali last week for the TOC after having been granted a wild card into the twelve-player round robin event. She immediately assumed the #12 seed. After losing to Yanina Wickmayer and getting a win over Anabel Medina-Garrigues in the RR, her season seemed to be over. But then Wickmayer (undefeated in the same Group as the Japanese vet) pulled out of the event after one match in the face of her one-year suspension by the Belgian anti-doping council (more on that in a moment). When the dust had settled, Date-Krumm was advanced into the SF. Her week ended there with a loss to Bartoli, but it was enough to put a beautiful shine on a campaign (her season-ending rank is now #82, jumping all the way up from her #101 spot from last week) that no one would have anticipated during her more than a decade away from the court. Meanwhile, MJMS arrived in Bali for the TOC as one of only two players (with Samantha Stosur) who also participated in the Season-Ending Championships in Doha. Fresh off her Doubles crown with Nuria Llagostera-Vives, she got wins over Stosur and Agnes Szavay and reached the SF to put a capper on one of the most surprising seasons on tour this year.
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FRESH FACE: Sacha Jones/NZL
...Jones has been on something of an ITF tear in the final quarter of '09. The 18-year old's $25K win in Rock Hill, South Carolina gives her a share of the circuit lead with five challenger titles this season. Rather than beat up on a series of Australians, this time she took out a slew of North Americans, from Grace Min to Sharon Fichman to Lauren Albanese, before defeating Croatia's Ani Mijacika 6-0/6-4 in the final.
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DOWN: Yanina Wickmayer/BEL
...first off, I'm going to blame Pam Shriver for all of this. Seriously, though, I'm of the mind that this sort of situation shouldn't be taking place in public view, which I'll explain in a moment. Now, that said, the blame for the one-year suspension levied on U.S. Open semifinalist Wickmayer by the Belgian anti-doping council has to at least somewhat be placed on the Belgian herself. She was under consideration for a suspension because of her whereabouts being "unknown" multiple times when she was required to check-in so that she could be subject to any possible drug tests. Wickmayer has maintained that she's had "password problems" and was unable to sign in to report her whereabouts during these flagged times under investigation. Fine, but considering that a suspension was known to be a possible punishment if you didn't make your location known, obviously, unless there's a greater story underneath all this (and after the Agassi book, who knows... and don't think that those revelations didn't play into the minds of the people who handed down this judgment, either), more effort should have been put forth by Wickmayer and/or her representatives to clear up the situation before it got to this point. Now, of course, maybe this is all a "cover story" and there was a "reason" Wickmayer didn't want to be found... but there's no actual evidence of that. Of course, any possibly hinky/secretive behavior by an athlete subject to testing is a red flag (just follow international cycling for a while to learn why sometimes smoke DOES mean there's fire nearby), and that's why this rule was instituted. But I've always had an issue, in principle, with suspending an athlete for any real length of time (and a year certainly constitutes that) whenever no actual drug test was failed, and extenuating circumstances would seem to make a violation of the rules on a "technicality" a minor one at best. Other athletes have been suspended for shorter periods of time after having actually failed tests, and some, such as Richard Gasquet, have been let "off the hook" by flimsier stories than Wickmayer's. Certainly, either way, with no actual test to hold up (not that that is a full-proof thing, either, considering this same anti-doping group's senseless dragging of Svetlana Kuznetsova's name through the mud a few years ago), I don't think such investigations should be made public or suspensions handed down until all appeals by the athlete are exhausted. Wickmayer intends to appeal, but the "immediate" nature of her suspension, followed by her quick withdrawal from a TOC she very easily could have won served no one any good (well, except for maybe Kimiko). If she wins her appeal and does indeed get to follow up her breakthrough '09 season on the WTA tour next year, you can be sure there won't be any apologies or Peer-esque reimbursement for any overstepping actions by the powers that be. This whole process makes everyone look "bad," on some level. International anti-doping efforts are a sticky thing, whether it be in dealing with an avowed innocent or the people hiding in the shadows devising new scientific ways to avoid detection of drugs in an athlete's system, even as the other side is brainstorming new ways to overturn every potential rock before whatever lurks beneath it can scurry away to safety. Nothing in this game is easy, but there has to be a better way to do things than this. Right?
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ITF PLAYER: Chan Yung-Jan/TPE
...Chan swept the singles and doubles titles at the $100K Taipei challenger, getting wins over Tamarine Tanasugarn, Kristina Mladenovic and Ayumi Morita in a 6-4/2-6/6-2 final. In doubles, she teamed with former regular partner Chuang Chia-Jung. Could a full-time reunion be in the cards for 2010?
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JUNIOR STAR: Ester Goldfeld/USA
...the 16-year old New Yorker won the Grade 2 event in Lexington, South Carolina over the weekend. After getting the short end of things against hard-serving Madison Keys early-on in the final, she went on to claim the title by a 0-6/6-2/7-5 score.
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1. FC Final #2 - Schiavone d. Oudin
...7-6/6-2. It just wasn't meant to be. Maybe if Oudin had been able to put this match away, some pressure might have been applied to the Italians, awakening both Oudin and Alexa Glatch's previous FC heroics from earlier this season. But after a rain delay with the American leading at 4-2 in the 1st set, things pretty much went the veteran-laden Team Italia's way from there on out. Oudin had managed to weather a similar rain delay earlier this year in FC action, when battling Argentina's Betina Jozami in a 2-6/4-0 match. Then, the American emerged from the delay to win eight of the final eleven games. This time, the veteran experience of Schiavone won out.
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2. FC Final #3 - Pennetta d. Oudin
...7-5/6-2. In what would be the clinching point in the FC final, Pennetta held a 4-2 lead and served at 5-4 30/love in the 1st set, only to see Oudin get a break and force her to work a little harder. It was the closest "Little MO" got to recapturing her U.S. Open mojo, but there was never really much expectation that she was going to lead the Americans to any sort of victory here.
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3. $50K Ismaning Final - Zahlavova-Strycova d. Barrois
...6-4/4-6/7-6. This was the Czech's second challenger title in as many weeks, following up her win in the $100K Ortesei event.
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4. TOC Group C RR - Date-Krumm d. Medina-Garrigues
...6-4/6-3. This is the second time in a row that Date-Krumm has knocked off AMG, as both victories followed a close three-set defeat at the hands of the Spaniard that proved that KDK was indeed capable of expanding her comeback beyond the challenger level.
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5. ITA Indoor Championships Final - Jana Jurikova (California) d. Irina Falconi (Georgia Tech)
...6-4/7-6. The Cal sophomore from the Slovak Republic knocked off Falconi, who was bidding to successfully follow up her title run at the All-American Championships, the NCAA's first slam event of the season (she defeated Chelsey Gullickson). More at Zoo Tennis.
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HM- TOC Final - Rezai d. Bartoli
...7-5 ret. Somehow, it seems fitting that the final WTA-sponsored match of the 2009 season would end in a retirement, doesn't it?
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**FED CUP FINALS - 2000-09**
2000 United States def. Spain
2001 Belgium def. Russia
2002 Slovak Republic def. Spain
2003 France def. United States
2004 Russia def. France
2005 Russia def. France
2006 Italy def. Belgium
2007 Russia def. Italy
2008 Russia def. Spain
2009 Italy def. United States

**2009 WEEKS IN TOP 10**
[of 45]
45 - Serena Williams, USA
45 - Dinara Safina, RUS
45 - Svetlana Kuznetsova, RUS
45 - Elena Dementieva, RUS
45 - Venus Williams, USA
45 - Jelena Jankovic, SRB
45 - Vera Zvonareva, RUS
34 - Victoria Azarenka, BLR
26 - Caroline Wozniacki, DEN
25 - Nadia Petrova, RUS
22 - Ana Ivanovic, SRB
18 - Agnieszka Radwanska, POL
5 - Flavi Pennetta, ITA
4 - Maria Sharapova, RUS

**2009 ALL-NATION WTA FINALS**
6...Russia
2...United States
1...Czech Republic
1...France
1...Italy

**MOST 2009 FINALS - BY NATION**
[x]- titles
26...Russia [13]
10...Italy [4]
9...France [5]
9...United States [5]
8...Denmark [3]

**BEST '09 WIN PCT. IN MULTIPLE FINALS**
1.000 - Victoria Azarenka (3-0)
1.000 - Shahar Peer (2-0)
1.000 - Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez (2-0)
1.000 - ARAVANE REZAI (2-0)
1.000 - Vera Zvonareva (2-0)
.750 - Serena Williams (3-1)
.750 - Svetlana Kuznetsova (3-1)
.750 - Elena Dementieva (3-1)

**MOST 2009 ITF TITLES**
5...Mailen Auroux, ARG
5...Maria Irigoyen, ARG
5...SACHA JONES, NZL
4...Julia Babilon, GER
4...Ayu-Fani Damayanti, THA
4...Sarah Gronert, GER
4...Polona Hercog, SLO


All for now.



THIS WEEK: Top 25 Players of the Decade - #1-5, & the 2009 Backspin Awards (with Ms.Backspin rankings)
NEXT WEEK: 2009 WTA Yearbook and the return of "ITF Backspin"

Read more...

The Decade's Best: Players #6-10

Backspin's "Decade's Best" countdown of the top players of the 2000's continues today with the five players ranked #6-10. No discussion about the past decade would be complete without these women, but each of them has one lingering "minus" that prevents them from legitimately challenging for the #1 position.

In the case of these players, future Hall-of-Famers from top-to-bottom, the "deal-breakers" range from a lack of overall singles results (due to a focus on doubles), an injury that prevented the extension of a brilliant second Act to a career from extending an important extra few seasons, early career troubles with breaking through on the big stage, mid-career struggles living up to early success, and late career difficulty maintaining a previous level of grand slam success against increased competition. Sometimes, the difference between a "Hall-of-Famer" and an "All-Time Great" is like a trench... narrow, but deep.

Thus, Players #6-10:

#10 - Cara Black, ZIM


One year from now, Black might be gently nudging aside Martina Navratilova to claim one of the most impressive doubles marks in WTA history, and it's mostly for that reason that she edged out #11 "Decade's Best" finisher Lisa Raymond, whose career numbers are remarkably similar to those of the veteran from Zimbabwe.

Way back at that start of her career, Black was one of the most successful dual-threat juniors of recent vintage. She was the #1-ranked junior in both singles and doubles in 1997, and won Girls titles at both Wimbledon and the U.S. Open that season. For Black, tennis was a family affair. Her late father Don, who had played at Wimbledon himself, was her coach, and her brothers Byron and Wayne played on the ATP Tour. Growing up with four grass courts in her back yard, it should come as no surprise that Black's relationship with The Championships has been a special one over the years, with maybe her most unique accomplishment being that she's won four different Wimbledon titles -- Girls Singles, Girls Doubles, Women's Doubles and Mixed Doubles -- in her career.

On the WTA tour, Black's junior singles success didn't totally translate. As a pro, her best slam result was a 4th Round at Roland Garros in '01, and she only advanced to the Wimbledon 3rd Round three times ('98, '03 & '05). Black did reach a high rank of #31 (in '99), won one title ('02 Waikoloa), reached another final ('00 Auckland) and finished in the Top 100 from 1998-03, but her name would most assuredly be made in doubles, as she's pretty much been exclusively a doubles player for most of the last half of the decade (though she did play some singles in '08 in order to qualify for the Olympic draw in Beijing). In the 2000's, Black won all 51 of her career doubles titles (second only to Raymond's 53 during the decade), including five Women's Doubles slams (three at Wimbledon, and one each at the Australian and U.S. Opens), as well as three Mixed slam titles (including the '02 Roland Garros & '04 Wimbledon with brother Wayne). In the Season-Ending Championships, Black won two titles (2007-08 with Liezel Huber) and appeared in the final six other times over the last ten seasons. Entering 2010, Black needs only a Roland Garros Women's Doubles and Australian Open Mixed championship to accomplish a career Slam in both doubles disciplines. Playing almost exclusively with Huber since 2005, Black has won four of her five slams (the other came with Rennae Stubbs) with the South African-turned-American, ranked #17 on the "Decade's Best" list. The pair's best season came in '07, when they went 69-14 and won Australian Open, Wimbledon and SEC titles. In 2008, I named them co-winners of the "Ms.Backspin" tour Player-of-the-Year award for that season. In 2009, Black failed to add a Doubles or Mixed title to her career totals, but she was never far away. She and Huber were runners-up at the U.S. Open and the SEC, and semifinalists at Roland Garros and Wimbledon. Black also reached the Mixed finals at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open.

Ultimately, though, it's Black's current lock on the #1 ranking that truly sets her apart, maybe from even Navratilova when all is said and done. A Top 10er from 2001-04, she first rose to the #1 ranking in 2005, and has yet to relinquish the spot since she last assumed it in July '07. At the end of 2009, Black will have been ranked #1 for thirty-one straight months (the last twenty-seven as co-#1 with Huber), second only to Navratilova's record of forty-one months. If she can maintain the ranking through the end of the '10 season, she'll break's Martina's 1986-90 record, which by then will have stood for nearly twenty-one years.

Interestingly, when Black made her ITF singles debut in 1992 in a challenger event in Harare, Zimbabwe she faced what would eventually become a familiar opponent in the 1st Round... Liezel Horn, who would marry in '00 and change her name to Huber. Black lost, but more than a decade later both realized that they could be more successful together than alone or with others. Ah, if they only knew then what we know now, they'd have had a good laugh when they shook each other's hand at the net.

#9 - Svetlana Kuznetsova, RUS


Maybe if Kuznetsova hadn't surprised everyone so much with her early slam win at the U.S. Open in 2004, the five years between that triumph and her eventual return to the slam winner's circle at Roland Garros in '09 wouldn't have seemed so disappointing. But after flashing her skills at age 19 in New York, proving what she WAS capable of accomplishing, little leeway was given the Russian as she failed time and time again to live up to her '04 success, from struggling to win regular tour finals to often missing golden grand slam opportunites to defeat players who would go on to win the tournament. Maybe more than any other player this decade, Kuznetsova walked the fine line between being a "great talent" and a "great player," often times falling on the "lesser" side of the equation.

A junior #1 in 2001, Kuznetsova quickly achieved Top 50 WTA seasons in 2002-03. But when she became the third Russian (after Anastasia Myskina & Maria Sharapova) during the spring/summer of '04 to win a slam championship, defeating fellow Hordette Elena Dementieva in the final, for a brief moment she looked as if she might be the most promising of all the surging Russian players. After climbing to #3 in '04, she nearly fell out of the Top 20 in '05 (she was year-end #18) and won no titles. She made slam final runs at Roland Garros in '06 and the U.S. Open in '07, and reached another slam SF and six QF over the next few years, but as the '09 season was in full swing it was easy to believe that the 2004 Open was going to simply be an aberration in a career which more often than not had seen Kuznetsova be consistently unable to put away a top opponent on a big stage. The evidence was certainly there.

In 2004, she held a match point against Myskina in the 4th Round of Roland Garros. She failed to convert it, and Myskina went on to win the title. A year later in Paris, she couldn't win a match point against Justine Henin in the 4th Round, then saw the Belgian become the champion three rounds later. At the 2009 Australian Open, Kuznetsova served for the match against Serena Williams in the QF. She lost the game, then the match. Williams won the title. Early in the '09 season, Kuznetsova found herself in a 1-10 rut in tour singles finals from 2007-08. While her Russian countrywomen were sweeping the Beijing Olympic Medal stand in '08, Kuznetsova was losing in the 1st Round. It just went on and on.

Still, after her '05 dip in results, she'd managed to once again finish seasons in the Top 10 from 2006-08, star on two Fed Cup-winning Russian teams, and was the only women to defeat Henin twice (in '04 & '07) when she was ranked #1. A winner of fourteen doubles titles in the decade, including five with Martina Navratilova in '03 and the Australian Open with Alicia Molik in '05, she never showed any physical or game-related reasons why she shouldn't be winning big tour titles.

A renowned free spirit, Kuznetsova moved back to Russia from her longtime training ground in Spain at the start of the '09 season, then enlisted Larisa Savchenko as her new coach. The changes seemed to work wonders, as for the first time as a pro she seemed settled and finally began to pick up where she'd left off five years earlier. And as far as this list goes, her "eleventh hour" return to form probably bridged the gap between this #9 ranking and one that would have probably been around #15.

After not winning a singles title outright since '06 (her '07 New Haven crown came when Agnes Szavay retired while leading the final), Kuznetsova won three in four final appearances in her final season in the 2000's, including her long-awaited second slam at Roland Garros (where she had much unfinished business) and in Beijing (where she'd missed out on the Russian party a year earlier), running her career total to twelve. After reaching the #3 ranking in '04, she returned there five years after the fact and got a fifth career win over a reigning #1 (with a defeat of then top-ranked Dinara Safina). She even notched a win at the Season-Ending championships, although though she once again failed to advance out of the Round Robin portion of the event for the fifth time in five appearances.

So, at age 24, Kuznetsova still has ground to cover in 2010 and beyond. Hopefully, it won't take her yet another five years to utilize her talent to its fullest. There is more than enough time for her to fully move from "great talent" to "great champion."

#8 - Amelie Mauresmo, FRA


As far as Mauresmo is concerned, it's all about 2006. For if she hadn't have had the grand '06 campaign in which she won both the Australian Open and Wimbledon titles, she would have undoubtably gone down in the history books as an elegant chapter with an ending that left the reader hanging for forever and a day.

In the end, while Mauresmo might not have won as many major titles as her fans and France would have hoped (and one day many years ago maybe even expected), that single six-month timespan in '06 forever transformed her career biography for the good. Blessed with a game that heavily featured a sweeping one-handed backhand, picture-perfect volleys and an athletic fluidity that more than bordered on graceful, Mauresmo often found herself undone by her fragile nerves. In fact, for a while, the situation made her appear to be an epic head case, no matter how eloquent and thoughtful she might have been both before and after matches.

Ironically, when Mauresmo burst onto the WTA scene in 1999 with a run to the Australian Open final at age 19, the classically beautiful nature of her brand of tennis wasn't even in the conversation. Instead, she found herself at the center of a media firestorm when her sexuality was made public just as she was simultaneously the subject of nasty and/or blithely-ignorant-to-the-connotations (depending on how you saw it at the time) comments from players such as Martina Hingis (and even Lindsay Davenport) about the "shocking" nature of Mauresmo's muscular, "manly" shoulders and hard shots. Mauresmo ultimately lost the final in straight sets to Hingis, and finished the season in the Top 10, but for years was never able to duplicate her early slam success, as it took her six years to make an appearance in another major final. No one will ever really know how that early unsettling experience in the spotlight might have effected her over those years, but she'd been the junior #1 in 1996 and won Girls titles at Roland Garros and Wimbledon and should have been used to some level of pressure to succeed. With her ability apparent, though, her four slam SF and nine QF from 2000-05 were met with more disappointment than admiration, and any time she found herself in a position to seize a moment in one of the season's four biggest tournaments, her eventual wince-inducing collapses were always but a few points point away.

Still, Mauresmo remained remarkably consistent, to a point. From 2001-05, she reached at least the 4th Round in twelve straight slam appearances (and nineteen of twenty into early '07), but by the middle of the decade there was a prevailing sense that her chances of winning an elusive slam title were quickly slipping away. Then, just in the nick of time, Mauresmo found her footing. She won the Season-Ending Championships to end her '05 season, providing her with a nice dose of confidence heading into the offseason. In Melbourne the following January, it paid off. Against an ill Justine Henin in the Australian Open final, Mauresmo claimed her first career slam title when the Belgian retired after completing two games in the 2nd set. The win came in the 26-year old Frenchwoman's 32nd career slam, the second-longest wait for any slam singles champion in WTA history behind Jana Novotna's win in her 45th slam. Still, some felt that Mauresmo's moment in the sun was ruined by Henin's retirement. No matter, she would go on to defeat Henin again in a three-set final later that season at Wimbledon, whose fabled lawns were a perfect compliment to Mauresmo's refined groundstrokes. Oddly enough, Mauresmo finished '06 ranked just #3 on the WTA computer, behind #1-ranked Henin, who'd won just one slam but reached the finals of all four that season (and wrapped up the top ranking at the SEC, where she defeated Mauresmo in the final).

Still, her ranking extended her streak of Top 10 seasons to six (2001-06). By the end of the 2009 season, she'd won over 500 matches and maintained a Top 30 ranking for twelve straight years (since '98). Aside from her two slam wins, Mauresmo has won twenty-three other singles titles (twenty-two in the 2000's), and was a Silver Medalist at the '04 Athens Olympics (Henin won Gold). In September 2004, she became the first Frenchwoman to become #1, a spot which she held for five weeks prior to her Australian Open win (making her the second, after Kim Clijsters, of the now four women who've claimed the top spot without winning a slam) before returning to the position for thirty-five more weeks in 2006.

While her slam wins filled the gaping hole in her resume, Mauresmo never did overcome the pressure of winning on the clay of Roland Garros in front of the French fans. Her best RG has been a pair of QF in 2003-04, which seems a bit paltry even with clay being the surface that probably is the least forgiving to Mauresmo's style of play. After her grand '06 season, she decided to forego any talk of retirement and played on, but has never come close to winning another slam. With various injuries and an appendectomy slowing her down and often taking her out of the game for months at a time, she hasn't advanced past a slam QF over the past three seasons. Of course, that doesn't mean she hasn't had some post-'06 success. In 2007, she won her third straight title in Antwerp and was awarded the tournament's famed diamond-studded racket, and earlier this year she finally won her first title in Paris... at the yearly indoor tournament held there, not Roland Garros.

Mauresmo ended her 2009 season early, openly talking of possibly retiring at age 30, but not allowing herself to commit to such a decision until she'd had more time to mull it over. Whether or not she returns to the tour in 2010, though, her legacy is secure. Whenever she DOES hang up her rackets she won't have to exit the sport as the unappreciated-by-the-masses, never-was-a-champ, couldn't-win-the-big-one character she might have gone down as if not for 2006.

Thankfully, that's an unfortunate alternate reality no one will have to live with, especially Amelie. Whew! It was soooo close.

#7 - Lindsay Davenport, USA


Davenport will be remembered as one of the best and most respected players in the women's game, both on and off court, but after winning three slam crowns over a sixteen-month period from September '98 to January '00, she spent much of the past decade being an "alternate choice" at most of the other twenty-four slams she played from 2000-08. If Andy Roddick's career was forever altered by the birth of a certain fellow in Switzerland, the same can be said about Davenport and a pair of siblings who grew up on Compton, California.

After having early success playing the type of big serve and heavy groundstroke game that was hardly the dominant style in the sport in the mid-to-late 1990's, it took the emerging challenge of equally powerful players for Davenport to finally get into the tip-top shape necessary to eliminate her on-court movement limitations as a major liability in maintaining her position as a contender in the big-hitting era of tennis that she helped usher in. Problem was, by the time she did, it was too late. She'd been surpassed, and she could never fully catch up. While the game was stoked by the arrival of such players as the Williamses, Davenport's unique power position in it was usurped as the sisters dominated the grand slam finals during the opening years of the decade. While she finished seasons at #1 three times during the decade (tying Henin for the most in the 2000's), Davenport never won another slam after beginning '00 by winning the Australian Open at just age 23.

Not that Davenport didn't come close. Sometimes achingly so. While she was still a dangerous top player after 2000, there always seemed to be at least one player who was positioned above Davenport on the ladder. And she was never able to end up a slam on the top rung.

In slams during the past decade, Davenport lost to Venus Williams five times (four times at Wimbledon), Henin four times (three coming at the Australian) and Serena Williams three tiems (twice at the U.S. Open). Ten times this decade she lost to the eventual slam champ (three Australian, four Wimbledon and three U.S. Opens). In the '05 Australian Open final, she led Serena 6-2/3-3, then dropped the final nine games of the match. Later that year, she held a match point against Venus in the Wimbledon final, then went on to lose a 9-7 3rd set in the longest women's championship match at the All-England Club. In the sixteen slams she entered after that loss, she never reached another SF. After winning in Melbourne in '00, Davenport put up very good results in the slams -- four finals, six SF, seven QF -- but was never able to carve out one final, late-career slam moment in the sun.

Injuries were always a struggle for Davenport, but she still had over 700 wins (6th all-time, and nearly 200 more than any current active player) in 947 matches (7th) and finished three years at #1 in the decade ('01, '04 & '05, following her initial #1 year in '98) even while never winning a slam in any of them. Her 55 career titles (29 this decade) are tied for 7th in WTA history, and she added 37 additional doubles titles (eight in the 2000's) to her totals, as well. Rising to the top ranking eight different times in her career, she held the spot for a total of 98 weeks (70 this decade), the last coming in January '06. Her four #1 seasons rank behind only Steffi Graf, Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert's career numbers, and are the most year-end top rankings by any woman since Graf's final #1 campaign (her eighth) back in 1996. Additionally, Davenport is one of only five players (Navratilova, Arantxa Sanchez Vicario, Martina Hingis & Kim Clijsters) to simultaneously hold the #1 spot in both singles and doubles, which she did for three weeks in 2000.

After having her first child in June '07, Davenport made a successful return to the sport later that year after an eleven-month absence, winning four titles in 2007-08 at age 31/32. At the end of '08, she announced her second pregnancy and left the tour again. She's yet to return to action, and probably won't.

Even without another Act to her career, Davenport is a sure-fire Hall-of-Famer, but one about whom it's impossible not to ponder a series of "What If?" scenarios. Without the emergence of the Williams Sisters, she might have doubled (at least) her career slam total and be considered the best player of her generation. As it is, she's not even in the Top 2 Americans. When she played her last match, no woman in WTA history had won more prize money than Davenport. One year later, she's been surpassed by both Serena AND Venus. Talk about emblematic. Rather than one of the "all-time" greats, Davenport will be viewed as the first name on the list of the "second tier" of top champions from her era.

So near, but oh so far.

#6 - Jennifer Capriati, USA


Capriati's career can almost be viewed as an archetype for the sport... times two.

She burst onto the scene with unprecedented hoopla, garnering a Sports Illustrated cover after her debut week on tour in March 1990 as a 13-year old with an exuberant personality and popping groundstrokes that were said to make her the can't-miss "Next Big Thing" in the sport. And, oh, she did burn white hot for a while. She reached the final of that debut tournament in Boca Raton (she lost to Gabriela Sabatini, but the tournament was jokingly dubbed "The Boca Raton of Capriati") to become the youngest-ever tour finalist, and would soon debut in the rankings at #25. Her title in Puerto Rico that season made her the fourth-youngest WTA champion ever, and that October she reached the Top 10 at 14 years, 7 months of age. In 1991, she defeated nine-time champ Martina Navratilova at Wimbledon and reached the SF at 15. In 1992, she won the Olympic singles Gold in Barcelona. From 1990-93, she reached three SF, six QF and three 4th Rounds at slams, finishing in the Top 10 all four seasons.

But by the mid-1990's, the bottom had fallen out of the Capriati fairy tale. Burned out and rebelling against anything she could find, she was out of the game entirely, save for one single match, in 1994-95 and was arrested for drug possession (having her America's-Sweetheart-Turned-America's-Most-Wanted mug shot plastered worldwide). From 1996-99, she had only a part-time presence on tour. It might have been the sorry, though hardly unique, end to what had been the story of an American child star. But Capriati didn't allow that to happen, for before the likes of Hingis, Clijsters and Henin made WTA comebacks, Jennifer laid down her own comeback path out of the darkness, adding "resilience" to her list of career characteristics.

As it was, her return was one of the most successful comebacks in all of sports history.

In 1999, she started slowly, winning two titles, her first in six years. In 2000, at age 23, having matured emotionally on court, as well as physically (she presented as solid an athletic specimen as any woman in the game), she rode her still-powerful groundstrokes all the way back. She reached the Australian Open SF in '00, her first such slam result in nine years, and led the USA to a Fed Cup title. In 2001, she returned to Melbourne and won the Australian title, defeating the game's top two ranked players (Davenport and Hingis) in straight sets to become the first woman to do so at a slam since 1979. With her confidence reaching new heights, she won Roland Garros, too. Eleven years after her debut there, Capriati returned to the Top 10 (her seven-year absence was a WTA record) and climbed into the #1 spot in October. And she wasn't finished, either. She went back to Melbourne the following January and defended her Oz title, saving four match points against Hingis in a rematch of the '01 final.

Aside from possibly the Williams Sisters, but arguably even more than them, Capriati might have been involved in more important moments during the decade than any other woman. Playing a role in quite possibly the three most significant matches of the 2000's, Capriati is forever linked to maybe the span's most historic, most dramatic, as well as most sport-changing matches.

In the 2001 Roland Garros final against Kim Clijsters, Capriati won a 12-10 final set in the longest deciding RG set in Open era history, a match in which she was two points from defeat four times. Before Federer/Nadal in the '08 Wimbledon final, there was Capriati/Clijsters. Then, in the 2003 U.S. Open SF against Justine Henin, Capriati found herself within two points of victory on eleven different occasions against the cramping Belgian in the 3:00 match. Henin won, then pulled maybe the most remarkable back-to-back two-fer of the decade when she returned the next night and defeated Clijsters in the final. A year later, the poor officiating in Capriati's U.S. Open QF match with Serena Williams is "unofficially" credited with being the straw that broke the camel's back and finally forced the sport to institute an instant replay challenge system. Add to that, the sport's installment of a so-dubbed "Capriati Rule," designed to protect young players and prevent a fall from grace similar to her's, that limits the number of tour events that young players can participate in during a given season, and one can legitimately say that Capriati's career continues and will continue to effect the sport for generations.

Capriati's time at #1 lasted seventeen weeks in 2001-02, and she was a year-end Top 10 player from 2001-04 (finishing a year-end best #2 in '01). After having such incredible early success in slams, from 2000-04 she added three slam wins, seven SF, four QF and three 4th Rounds in nineteen events. Alas, there would be no Third Act to her WTA career. Shoulder problems ultimately did her in. Despite multiple surgeries designed to help her return to action, she was never able to do so. Her final tour title came in New Haven in 2003, and she last played in 2004. In all, she won fourteen singles titles (six in the 2000's).

At this point, Capriati has been gone so long that it seems as if her comeback took place a lifetime ago. If only she'd been able to extend her glorious return into the mid-2000's, her legacy would feel more "current" and longstanding, and she'd have been in the Top 5 on this list. Still, her's is and will continue to be one of the most enduring redemption stories of this or any other decade.

NEXT: #1-5 & Decade's Honors




1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6. Jennifer Capriati, USA
7. Lindsay Davenport, USA
8. Amelie Mauresmo, FRA
9. Svetlana Kuznetsova, RUS
10. Cara Black, ZIM
11. Lisa Raymond, USA
12t. Virginia Ruano Pascual, ESP
12t. Paola Suarez, ARG
14. Rennae Stubbs, AUS
15. Elena Dementieva, RUS
16. Martina Hingis, SUI
17. Liezel Huber, RSA/USA
18. Mary Pierce, FRA
19. Dinara Safina, RUS
20. Daniela Hantuchova, SVK
21. Ana Ivanovic, SRB
22. Jelena Jankovic, SRB
23. Ai Sugiyama, JPN
24. Anastasia Myskina, RUS
25. Patty Schnyder, SUI
HONORABLE MENTION- Martina Navratilova, USA

Here are the remaining 5 players on the countdown list:

Kim Clijsters
Justine Henin
Maria Sharapova
Serena Williams
Venus Williams

*BACKSPIN'S 2000-09 HONOR ROLL, #27-113*
Nicole Arendt
Shinobu Asagoe
Victoria Azarenka
Sybille Bammer
Marion Bartoli
Daja Bedanova
Alona Bondarenko
Kateryna Bondarenko
Kristie Boogert
Elena Bovina
Severine Bremond
Els Callens
Anna Chakvetadze
Chan Yung-Jan
Chuang Chia-Jung
Dominika Cibulkova
Sorana Cirstea
Amanda Coetzer
Eleni Daniilidou
Nathalie Dechy
Casey Dellacqua
Mariaan de Swardt
Jelena Dokic
Silvia Farina Elia
Clarisa Fernandez
Tatiana Golovin
Anna-Lena Groenefeld
Carly Gullickson
Julie Halard-Decugis
Anke Huber
Janette Husarova
Kaia Kanepi
Sesil Karatantcheva
Vania King
Anna Kournikova
Michaella Krajicek
Lina Krasnoroutskaya
Li Na
Li Ting
Elena Likhovtseva
Sabine Lisicki
Petra Mandula
Marta Marrero
Conchita Martinez
Anabel Medina-Garrigues
Sania Mirza
Alicia Molik
Corina Morariu
Miriam Oremans
Melanie Oudin
Shahar Peer
Flavia Pennetta
Tatiana Perebiynis
Kveta Peschke
Nadia Petrova
Kimberly Po-Messerli
Agnieszka Radwanska
Anastasia Rodionova
Chanda Rubin
Lucie Safarova
Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario
Mara Santangelo
Barbara Schett
Francesca Schiavone
Monica Seles
Magui Serna
Antonella Serra-Zanetti
Meghann Shaughnessy
Anna Smashnova
Karolina Sprem
Katarina Srebnotnik
Samantha Stosur
Carla Suarez-Navarro
Sun Tiantian
Agnes Szavay
Tamarine Tanasugarn
Patricia Tarabini
Nathalie Tauziat
Nicole Vaidisova
Dominique van Roost
Elena Vesnina
Yanina Wickmayer
Caroline Wozniacki
Yan Zi
Zheng Jie
Fabiola Zuluaga
Vera Zvonareva

All for now.



"DECADE'S BEST" SERIES:
...Players of the 2000's: Nomination List, Australian Open 2000-09, Roland Garros 2000-09, Wimbledon 2000-09, U.S. Open 2000-09, Players #21-25, Players #16-20, Players #11-15

Read more...

Wk.43- Simply Another Pleat in Her Cape

Serena Williams has a way of making major accomplishments seem minor (and, no, I'm not talking about what she thinks about Dinara Safina's titles in Rome and Madrid).

For any other player, winning a Season-Ending Championship title would be a bejeweled tiara surely featured as a showpiece in a career collection. But for Serena, her Doha victory (after a 5-0 week that saw her defeat her sister Venus twice, once coming back from match point to do it) is more like a sparkly bauble picked up on a spur-of-the-moment shopping spree, admired at the moment of purchase but soon tucked into a rarely-explored corner of a packed-to-the-gills jewelry box.

Isn't it pretty? Now, when's the next fancy-catching moment set to arrive?

Ultimately, the most important thing about Williams' title run in Doha is that it included yet another crash landing by former #1 Dinara Safina, one that propelled Serena into the year-end #1 ranking (for the just the second time in her career, and the first since three-quarters of the way into "Serena Slam" in 2002) and shut down any possibility for lingering discussions about what's "wrong" with the WTA tour as the #1 player really isn't perceived as being the #1 player. It all worked out in the end.

Now, the runway is clear to talk about the 2010 season possibly featuring the most crowded, competitive upper-echelon women's tennis since, well, maybe ever. If everyone can stay healthy, and as the long line out the trainer's office door in Doha showed, that's a BIG "if," next season might be one for the history books when it comes to a perfect storm of all-time greats, longstanding legacies, attempts to reclaim past glory and breakthroughs from intriguing new faces all coming together at just the right time to make the chatter about any perceived "lack of quality" a distant memory.

All in all, I suppose this was the appropriate end to the 2000's for Williams. After all, after a decade in which she gave birth to a "Serena Slam" (far more impressive than, say, giving birth and THEN winning a slam, for instance), she couldn't rightly go out with a loss, now could she?

I mean, if she'd done that, she might have wanted to stuff a tennis ball down... well, you know.

*WEEK 43 CHAMPIONS*

SEASON-ENDING CHAMPIONSHIPS (Doha,QAT/hard outdoor)
S: Serena Williams d. Venus Williams 6-2/7-6
D: Llagostera-Vives/Martinez-Sanchez d. Black/Huber 7-6/5-7/10-7


PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Serena Williams/USA
...hmmm, two grand slam singles titles. Three grand slam doubles titles. A SEC crown. The year-end #1 ranking. Is THAT enough to become a two-time "Ms. Backspin" winner? Ummm, well, if your name is Serena Williams, I don't think so. Being Serena, expectations are a b-i-t-c-you know what. With anyone else, including her sister, a 2009 season like that would be a lock-it-up Player of the Year situation. It usually would be in this space, too. But if some people (though I wasn't one of them) didn't see fit to award Amelie Mauresmo as POY when she won two slams in 2006 (many tapped Justine Henin, who'd won one and reached the finals of all four), then how can Serena be a sure thing? A title or two at any of the "lesser" stops on the tour, just to balance out the season of the tour's most talented player, would have set things in cement, but the lack of such a thing left open the door just enough that either the Italian or American Fed Cup team will smash it down with one collective shoulder this weekend. Oh, well. With Justine and Maria and Co. all back at full strength in 2010, Serena might actually be able to earn her Ms.B props with just ONE slam title next time around. Sometimes, it's funny how things work out.
=============================
RISER: Caroline Wozniacki/DEN

AP/Kirsty Wigglesworth
...just call her Princess Charming with the heart of a lion. Wozniacki didn't win the SEC this weekend, but she was the most impressive player there all week long. Coming in with a hamstring injury at the end of a very long (and hopefully the last of it's kind when it comes to her future schedules) season, having to answer pointless questions about that Luxembourg retirement, and being forced to play in the excessive desert heat that managed to wilt several other competitors, C-Woz gave it her all, and then some. Of course, the image that'll be ingrained in everyone's mind will be the sight of a severely cramping Wozniacki crumpling to the court in the final game, up 5-4 30/30, of her Round Robin match against Vera Zvonareva. There she was, flopping around like a carp at the bottom of a boat as she cried and wondered if she was going to have to be carried off the court. Out of injury timeouts, she managed to climb to her feet and win the final few points of the game to take the match, walking to the net while sobbing and fighting off yet another full-body attack of cramps. If this was a grand slam, it would have been an indelible moment etched forever in tennis history. But being that it was the SEC, a big event that still is traditionally mostly ignored by the masses, it'll have to serve a a prelude to whatever comes next for C-Woz. Thing is, that moment was just one of many for Wozniacki in Doha that speaks volumes about what she's capable of achieving if she can just guard against wearing herself out and develop her second serve into something less cotton-candified than its current state. In her first RR match, she overcame a match point to defeat Victoria Azarenka in a 2:58 match. Against Zvonareva, she wasn't derailed by blowing a 6-0/5-2 lead with two match points (one of which she won, only to see it overturned via replay), then won the final three games while violently cramping despite having fallen behind 4-3 in that 3rd set. C-Woz pretty much ran out of gas after that, losing in straight sets to Jelena Jankovic and retiring in the 2nd set of the SF against Serena. But after reaching her second major SF, and currently finding herself at #4 in the rankings, the Princess of Charm showed in Doha that she has a bit of "Princess of Harm" in her, too. And that's something from which a real champion can be born.
=============================
SURPRISE: Agnieszka Radwanska/POL
...A-Rad wasn't even supposed to play in the SEC. As the second-alternate, she seemed to have simply received an end-of-season trip to the desert. But when both Dinara Safina and her replacement, Vera Zvonareva, fell away with injuries, Radwanska was called upon to play the final Round Robin match of the tournament against Victoria Azarenka. The Belarusian needed a victory to advance to the SF ahead of Wozniacki, and led the match 6-4/5-2. But when Azarenka was struck in her season's last appearance in a major event with heat-related difficulties, just as she had been in her first in Melbourne in January, everything turned around. After winning the 2nd set 7-5, then racing to a 4-1 3rd set lead, A-Rad saw Azarenka retire due to cramping, sending C-Woz to the semis and stuffing an extra $100,000 into the Pole's pocket, as well. The same thing happened to Radwanska a year ago, when Ana Ivanovic's virus-related exit allowed alternate A-Rad to play a single SEC match. She won it, too, defeating Svetlana Kuznetsova.
=============================
VETERANS: Nuria Llagostera-Vives/Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez, ESP & Rossana de los Rios/PAR
...even though they've had a fine season, it's probably safe to say that Llagostera-Vives/Martinez-Sanchez was the least talked-about/well-known of the four teams that qualified for the SEC Doubles championship semifinals. The #3-seeded Spanish vets never got a shot at #4 Sam Stosur/Rennae Stubbs, but they DID knock out the top two pairs en route to the title. Wins over both the #2-seeded Williams Sisters in the SF and #1-seeded Black/Huber in the final came via the super tie-breaker format in the 3rd set, in 10-8 and 10-7 victories, respectively. The all-Spanish team's seven '09 titles are the most on tour this season. In the $25K Bayamon challenger, Paraguay's de los Rios won her thirteenth career ITF singles title (and second of '09) with a straight sets victory over Mirjana Lucic in the final. In order to get into the deciding match, 34-year old DLR notched wins over four teenagers: Madison Keys (14), Ajla Tomljanovic (16), Julia Glushko (19) and Alison Riske (19). So, DLR must feel good today... even if she might feel something akin to having taken candy from a successive string of babies.
=============================
FRESH FACES: Lyudmyla Kichenok/UKR & Chanel Simmonds/RSA
...last time out, Lyudmyla Kichenok was defeating her twin sister Nadiya in the final of a challenger back home in Ukraine. This weekend in a $10K in Stockholm, the 17-year old was avenging her sister's loss to Emma Laine (the Fin defeated Nadiya in the QF) in the SF, then winning her second of back-to-back titles with a victory over 18-year old Hordette Marta Sirotkina in the final. Of course, being a good sister, Lyudmyla didn't let Nadiya leave Stockholm empty-handed, as they also paired to claim the doubles title. Meanwhile, South Africa's Chanel Simmonds, 17, won her first career pro title with a 6-1/6-0 victory over Davinia Lobbinger in the final of the $10K Pretoria event. Simmonds, a Girls quarterfinalist at Roland Garros earlier this season, had been 0-3 in her previous ITF challenger finals.
=============================
DOWN: Dinara Safina/RUS & Victoria Azarenka/BLR
...Safina's horrendous final quarter came to a merciful, crashing halt in Doha when she retired with a back injury in the third game of her opening SEC match against Jelena Jankovic. Safina said she's been having difficulties with the injury for months, which might explain some of her most recent eye-popping upsets at the hands of triple-digit ranked players. After a season that saw her spend the majority of time ranked #1, yet be forced to bear the brunt of a torrent of criticism about her "unearned" spot atop the game and her inability to show in the latter stages of slams, this was somehow a sad-but-fitting end to what probably should have been her career-best year but will instead go down as a disappointment that she may never fully distance herself from now that the WTA's slam-seeking ranks are about to be re-infused with a few additional big-time title-grabbers starting in a few months. After at first questioning whether her back would even allow her to play in Melbourne next year, Safina has since said she'll be playing in Brisbane in Week 1. Of course, Serena said she was going to be playing in Fed Cup, too... so take it with a grain of salt. Elsewhere in Doha, Azarenka's shortcomings were maybe put on grand display like no other's during the past week. The talent and drive are there, for sure, but something essential is missing that will prevent her from joining the "elite" of the tour unless she corrects the problem. Just comparing her to Wozniacki in Doha is fairly enlightening. They played each other in the fourth match, and Azarenka held a match point, but the cramping Dane managed to push through her injury and win the match while Azarenka's hopes dissolved into another racket-smashing tantrum when things got tough. Thing is, you can see these outbursts coming, yet she seems incapable of stopping them from blossoming into reality. Sure, the prep time is as short as a tsunami warning, but Azarenka needs to learn how to get to high ground before it's too late. Against C-Woz, Azarenka served for the match at 5-3 in the 3rd, and held a match point at 5-4. She didn't convert. At 5-5, with her recent failure still fresh in her mind, a couple of poor groundstrokes and a missed overhead sounded the alarm. Viewing the match, I said, "Watch out, here it comes." One point later, Azarenka angrily shot a ball into the stands. Then she smashed her racket, producing a second code violation of the match (and, thanks to Serena, we know what that means), giving Wozniacki a point. Since it was on break point, the Dane went up 6-5 and soon served out the match at 7-5. In their next matches, a wildly cramping Wozniacki lost a 6-0/5-2 lead against Zvonareva, but managed to pull out the match. Azarenka, needing a win to reach the SF over Wozniacki, led Radwanska 6-4/5-2, but ended up blowing the lead and retiring with cramps down 4-1 in the 3rd. Azarenka might have the bigger game of the two, but Wozniacki has the steady heart and courage that give her the intangible edge right now. Unless Azarenka closes that gap, C-Woz will continue to be a rung ahead of her on the rankings ladder.
=============================
ITF PLAYER: Jelena Dokic/AUS
...a week ago, Dokic reached the $50K final in Joue-Les-Tours, only to lose to Sofia Arvidsson. This weekend, she got a measure of instant revenge... X two. In the $100K Poitiers challenger, Dokic lost one set en route to yet another final (taking out the likes of Stephanie Foretz, Anastasia Rodionova, Lucie Hradecka and Alla Kudryavtseva), then defeated familiar foe Arvidsson 6-4/6-4 in the final. This is Dokic's second $100K challenger title of the season, and her ranking is up to #57. Come January, she'll arrive in Melbourne not needing a wild card to get into the Australian Open draw, and maybe with a nice dose of confidence and momentum. Even with all the other "welcome back" moments sure to spice up play at 2010's first slam, from Justine to Kim to Maria and so on, Dokic's return one year after her crowd-pleasing '09 story-of-the-tournament QF run might be the most intriguing. After seeing a drop-off in her post-Oz results, then an injury/illness-related absence, Dokic has rebounded rather well in the last third of this season. It could be the foundation upon which a truly resurgent '10 campaign is about to be built.
=============================
JUNIOR STAR: Tang Haochen/CHN
...the 15-year old Chinese girl claimed both the singles and doubles titles at the LTAT Junior Championships, a Grade 2 event in Thailand, defeating 16-year old Brit Lucy Brown 4-6/7-6/6-0 in the final. "Lucy Brown"... hmmm, I wonder if Mack the Knife had a hand in her murderous 3rd set loss? Brown, for her part, might be another name to watch in the growing pool of young talent from Great Britain, as she defeated Japan's Miyabi Inoue earlier in the tournament. As for Tang, this victory gives her a perfect 36-0 singles record this year (she's won all seven tournaments she's played in Asia and Australia), as well as a 23-2 mark in doubles (4 titles, 2 runners-up).
=============================


1. SEC RR #7 - Wozniacki d. Zvonareva

Reuters/Fadi Al-Assaad
...6-0/6-7/6-4. A classic, and the sort of match that can define a player in a mind's eye forever. C-Woz led 6-0/5-2 and had two match points, then saw her day nearly go down the drain as full-body cramps left her flat on her back, a sobbing Danish mess just outside the service box. Still, she pulled herself together and staggered into the winner's circle. Of course, this situation might say as much about Zvonareva as it does Wozniacki. The Russian turned out to be the one who pulled out of the event after this match, citing her early-season knee injury... but one has to wonder if the trouble might have been complicated by an affliction a little higher up the body, as well.
=============================
2. SEC RR #6 - S.Williams d. V.Williams
...5-7/6-4/7-6. Serena was up two breaks in the 3rd, but Venus turned the match around and even held a match point at 6-5. Serena saved it, then managed to win the fourteen-break match (it's only the second time in their 23-match series that one has come back from MP to win, the other being Serena doing it again in Bangalore last season). In the end, they were only one point apart on the stat sheet. Serena, of course, held the advantage.
=============================
3. SEC Final - S.Williams d. V.Williams
...6-2/7-6. Venus, who advanced to the SF despite a 1-2 RR record, should be commended for even getting the chance to defend her '08 title. Going in, that didn't seem a very good bet.
=============================
4. SEC RR #4 - Wozniacki d. Azarenka
...1-6/6-4/7-5. Talk about foreshadowing. Wozniacki cramps up, but wins. Azarenka holds match point, breaks a racket and loses. One exits 2009 after having seen the light, while the other is battling to stay one step ahead of her dark side. The yin/yang contrast between these two at this event made all that "good girl"/"bad girl" talk about them in this space earlier this season well worth it.
=============================
5. SEC RR #12 - A.Radwanska d. Azarenka
...4-6/7-5/4-1 ret. Up a set and 5-2, then cramping and losing her second "in-the-bag" match of the Round Robin, Azarenka has some work to do this offseason in order to be better prepared for 2010. Just don't go to Mexico to train, Victoria!
=============================
6. SEC RR #5 - Jankovic d. Safina
...1-1 ret. This result both assured Serena's ultimate return to #1 and played a large part in getting Jankovic into the SF. If Azarenka had defeated A-Rad, the Belarusian and JJ would have advanced to the semis from the White Group over Wozniacki, who'd come back from match point down and cramping to win two matches, but would have been left behind because Safina COULDN'T continue. That would have been a truly Jankovician development if there ever was one.
=============================
7. SEC RR #1 - Azarenka d. Jankovic
...6-2/6-3. Things started out so well for Azarenka. Then again, she did win a title in Week 1 of this season, too. So, she has a track record.
=============================
8. SEC RR #2 - Dementieva d. V.Williams
...3-6/7-6/6-2. Elena's participation in the SEC pretty much ended after this. She was outdistanced 24-11 in games in her final two matches.
=============================
9. SEC Doubles Final - Llagostera-Vives/Martinez-Sanchez d. Black/Huber
...7-6/5-7/10-7. Watching this one, I couldn't determine whether MJMS is extremely tall, or NLV is actually just very short. Either way, height-wise, they're quite the odd-looking coupling.
=============================
10. $10K Pretoria Final - Chanel Simmonds d. Davinia Lobbinger
...6-1/6-0. The 17-year old South African wins her first career pro title, after having gone 0-3 in three previous finals.
=============================
HM- $100K Poitiers 2nd Rd - Kudryavtseva d. Cibulkova
...6-2/6-0. Lost amidst all the comeback stories of '09 has been the truly disappointing season of Cibulkova (the #1 seed here). A Top 20 player to end 2008, she seemed set for bigger things. It just hasn't happened. She's been injured, for sure, but even when healthy she hasn't lived up to the promise she showed a season ago. As it is, she's still searching for her first career tour title, and is currently the third highest-ranked player (#27) without one (#23 Elena Vesnina and #26 Alla Kudryavtseva are the "battlefield generalettes" in that particular conflict, having displaced Victoria Azarenka in the unwanted role the Belarusian held at the conclusion of the previous two seasons).
=============================


**2000's WTA YEAR-END #1's**
2000 Martina Hingis, SUI
2001 Lindsay Davenport, USA
2002 Serena Williams, USA
2003 Justine Henin-Hardenne, BEL
2004 Lindsay Davenport, USA
2005 Lindsay Davenport, USA
2006 Justine Henin-Hardenne, BEL
2007 Justine Henin, BEL
2008 Jelena Jankovic, SRB
2009 Serena Williams, USA

**MOST SEC TITLES - ACTIVE**
2...Kim Clijsters
2...Justine Henin
2...SERENA WILLIAMS
1...Amelie Mauresmo
1...Maria Sharapova
1...Venus Williams

**2009 - WEEKS AT #1 (as of Nov.2)**
26...Dinara Safina, RUS
14...SERENA WILLIAMS, USA
4...Jelena Jankovic, SRB

**2009 MOST WTA SINGLES TITLES**
3...SERENA WILLIAMS, USA
3...Dinara Safina, RUS
3...Svetlana Kuznetsova, RUS
3...Caroline Wozniacki, DEN
3...Elena Dementieva, RUS
3...Victoria Azarenka, BLR

**2009 MOST WTA DOUBLES TITLES - TEAMS**
7...LLAGOSTERA-VIVES/MARTINEZ-SANCHEZ, ESP
5...Black/Huber, ZIM/USA
4...Williams/Williams, USA/USA

**CAREER WTA TITLES - ACTIVE**
41...Justine Henin
41...Venus Williams
35...SERENA WILLIAMS
35...Kim Clijsters
25...Amelie Mauresmo
20...Maria Sharapova

**SERENA vs. VENUS**
[2009]
Dubai SF - Venus 6-1/2-6/7-6
Miami SF - Serena 6-4/3-6/6-4
Wimbledon Final - Serena 7-6/6-2
SEC Round Robin - Serena 6-7/6-4/7-6
SEC Final - Serena 6-2/7-6
[3rd-Set Tie-Breaks]
2008 Bangalore SF - Serena wins 7-4
2009 Dubai SF - Venus wins 7-3
2009 SEC Round Round - Serena wins 7-4
[Match Point Overcome]
2008 Bangalore SF (Serena wins)
2009 SEC Round Robin (Serena wins)





FED CUP FINAL (Calabria, Italy - red clay)
08 Final: Russia d. Spain
=============================
Italy def. United States 4-1

...Italy has never beaten the U.S. in Fed Cup, currently riding a 0-9 losing streak. Still, if the Americans (Huber, Oudin, Glatch & King) can defeat the veteran-laden Italian team (Pennetta, Schiavone, Errani & Vinci) in Italy, on clay... well, let's just call this potential Cinderella title run possibly the most improbable in tennis history. Of course, it probably won't happen, especially without a Williams in the mix. Then again, after Mary Joe Fernandez's "B"-teamers got Team USA this far, it's actually better that their fate will be determined by THEM, not by some "ringer" added to the roster at the last moment even though they had absolutely nothing to do with getting the team this far. Win or lose, this is the way it should be. And let the winning team hereby be dubbed 2009's "Ms. Backspin."


TOURNAMENT OF CHAMPIONS (Bali, Indonesia - hard indoor)
08 Final: (new event)
=============================
=Round Robin=
*GROUP A*
(7)Peer 2-0
(1)Bartoli 1-1
(11)Rybarikova 0-2
*GROUP B*
(2)Stosur 2-0
(6)Martinez-Sanchez 1-1
(9)Szavay 0-2
*GROUP C*
(3)Wickmayer 2-0
(12)Date-Krumm 1-1
(5)Medina-Garrigues 0-2
*GROUP D*
(4)Lisicki 2-0
(8)Czink 1-1
(10)Rezai 0-2

=SF/FINAL=
Peer(A), Stosur(B), Wickmayer(C) & Lisicki(D)

...I'm not sure how the semifinals will be drawn up (Group A vs. B, Group A vs. C, etc.), so I'll just pick the Group winners and rank their chances of winning the inaugural Tournament of Champions title as thus:

1. Stosur
2. Wickmayer
3. Peer
4. Lisicki


All for now.



THIS WEEK: "Top 25 Players of the Decade - #6-10 & #1-5"
NEXT WEEK: 2009 Backspin Awards & Ms. Backspin

Read more...

2009 Regional Honors

The 2009 Backspin Awards are still a week away, so consider this something of a mini-preview... region by region.

==NORTH AMERICA==
PLAYER OF THE YEAR: Serena Williams, USA
POY (RUNNER-UP): Venus Williams, USA
RISER: Aleksandra Wozniak, CAN
SURPRISE: Vania King, USA
VETERAN: Liezel Huber, USA
FRESH FACE: Melanie Oudin, USA
COMEBACK: Alexa Glatch, USA
DOWN: Mashona Washington, USA
ITF PLAYER: Valerie Tetreault, CAN
UNDERRATED: Carly Gullickson, USA
DOUBLES: Serena Williams/Venus Williams, USA
JUNIOR: Sloane Stephens, USA

==SOUTH AMERICA==
PLAYER OF THE YEAR: Gisela Dulko, ARG
POY (RUNNER-UP): Mailen Auroux, ARG
RISER: Gabriela Paz, VEN
SURPRISE: Bianca Botto, PER
VETERAN: Rossana de los Rios, PER
FRESH FACE: Veronica Cepede Royg, PAR
COMEBACK: Catalina Castano, COL
DOWN: Mariana Duque Marino, COL
ITF PLAYER: Meilen Auroux, ARG
UNDERRATED: Maria Irigoyen, ARG
DOUBLES: Gisela Dulko, ARG
JUNIOR: Camila Silva, CHI

==ASIA/PACIFIC==
PLAYER OF THE YEAR: Samantha Stosur, AUS
POY (RUNNER-UP): Li Na, CHN
RISER: Hsieh Su-Wei/Peng Shuai, TPE/CHN
SURPRISE: Zhang Shuai, CHN
VETERAN: Kimiko Date-Krumm, JPN
FRESH FACE: Chang Kai-Chen, TPE
COMEBACK: Jelena Dokic, AUS
DOWN: Chan Yung-Jan/Chuang Chia-Jung, TPE
ITF PLAYER: Sacha Jones, NZL
UNDERRATED: Yaroslava Shvedova, KAZ
DOUBLES: Samantha Stosur/Rennae Stubbs, AUS
JUNIOR: Noppawan Lertcheewakarn, THA

==AFRICA/MIDDLE EAST==
PLAYER OF THE YEAR: Shahar Peer, ISR
POY (RUNNER-UP): Cara Black, ZIM
RISER: Pemra Ozgen, TUR
SURPRISE: Cagla Buyukakcay, TUR
VETERAN: Cara Black, ZIM
FRESH FACE: Ons Jabeur, TUN
COMEBACK: Shahar Peer, ISR
DOWN: Natalie Grandin, RSA
ITF PLAYER: Chanelle Scheepers, RSA
UNDERRATED: Chanelle Scheepers, RSA
DOUBLES: Cara Black, ZIM
JUNIOR: Chanel Simmonds, RSA

==RUSSIA==
PLAYER OF THE YEAR: Svetlana Kuznetsova
POY (RUNNER-UP): Dinara Safina
RISER: Vera Zvonareva
SURPRISE: Elena Vesnina
VETERAN: Elena Dementieva
FRESH FACE: Ekaterina Makarova
COMEBACK: Maria Sharapova
DOWN: Anna Chakvetadze
ITF PLAYER: Regina Kulikova
UNDERRATED: Vera Dushevina
DOUBLES: Alisa Kleybanova
JUNIOR: Ksenia Pervak

==REST OF EUROPE==
PLAYER OF THE YEAR: Caroline Wozniacki, DEN
POY (RUNNER-UP): Flavia Pennetta, ITA
RISER: Yanina Wickmayer, BEL
SURPRISE: Melinda Czink, HUN
VETERAN: Francesca Schiavone, ITA
FRESH FACE: Victoria Azarenka, BLR
COMEBACK: Kim Clijsters, BEL
DOWN: Ana Ivanovic, SRB
ITF PLAYER: Alexandra Dulgheru, ROU
UNDERRATED: Petra Kvitova, CZE
DOUBLES: Nuria Llagostera-Vives/Maria Jose Martinez-Sanchez, ESP
JUNIOR: Kristina Mladenovic, FRA



Hey, it's never too early to look ahead to next year. Two months from the kickoff of the 2010 season, the upcoming campaigns of which players would seem to be the most intriguing? Well, here are a few to watch...


Justine Henin & Kim Clijsters, BEL: Make no mistake, their '10 results will not only be judged against the field and their respective pasts, but also in comparison to one another. If Henin opens with a huge trip Down Under in January, will Clijsters' will wane? If Clijsters carries over her Open success to Melbourne, surely no one will wonder if Henin might lose HER comeback desire. Ah, a year of Backspin "back to the future" fun awaits.
=============================
Sabine Lisicki, GER: if she can stay on the court, might a Top 10 run be in her near future?
=============================
Melanie Oudin, USA: So far, the U.S. Open letdown has been in full effect. Next year, the pressure to improve even more will be still greater. Can she be continue to be as tough as she was this summer?
=============================
Victoria Azarenka, BLR: In 2009, the A-Train both arrived on schedule and derailed at times throughout the season. Early in the season, she won her first title but literally couldn't take the heat in Melbourne. At the end of the season, she secured her Top 10 ranking but went out in the Doha heat with cramps. In between, at times, she looked like the next big WTA star, then imploded in a crash of anger and broken rackets at others. Which will she be in 2010?
=============================
Yanina Wickmayer, BEL: Is the WTA big enough for THREE Belgians in the Top 15? How about the Top 10?
=============================
Maria Sharapova, RUS: Back for a full season, with her serve on her side... maybe. If so, 2010 is going to be a great, wild ride for all.
=============================
Urszula Radwanska, POL: By the end of next season, could Agnieszka be feeling Urszula's breath on the back of her neck when it comes to determining who's the best player in the family?
=============================
Laura Robson & Heather Watson, GBR: There's safety in numbers, and England now has TWO young stars to root for. But which is going to have the brightest future?
=============================
Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, RUS: Back-to-back late-season wins over Venus could mark the end of Pavlyuchenkova's apprenticeship and the beginning of the title-winning phase of her pro career.
=============================
Sarah Gronert, GER: If she starts playing in and advancing through tour qualifiying rounds, might the whole controversy about Gronert's participation be sparked yet again?
=============================
Klaudia Jans & Alicja Rosolska, POL: In their mid-twenties and one of the most regular, day-in-and-day-out teams on the tour, their results keep getting better.
=============================
Chelsey Gullickson, USA: Will the Georgia Bulldog sophomore star carry over her in-season success and win the NCAA women's singles championship in 2010?
=============================





Looking to "buy stock" in a few players for 2010? Getting cold feet and thinking you should "sell" your holdings in one of those past investments? Here are a few WTA "market tips"... take them to heart at your own peril.

=BUY=
NORTH AMERICA: Madison Keys, USA
...she's got a thunderous serve as a weapon, and she's still only 14.

SOUTH AMERICA: Roxane Vaisemberg/BRA & Veronica Cepede Royg, PAR
...there aren't many young South Americans winning ITF titles these days, but Vaisemberg (20) and Cepede Royg (17) did in '09.

ASIA/PACIFIC: Chang Kai-Chen, TPE
...her late-season win over Safina was just one of the name-dropping moments that's pushed the 18-year old to the cusp of the Top 100.

AFRICA/MIDDLE EAST: Shahar Peer, ISR
...with Dubai and the slump behind her, Peer should be ready to rock-n-roll again next season.

RUSSIA: Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova
...next stop: Top 20.

REST OF EUROPE: Sabine Lisicki, GER
...please stay healthy, please stay healthy, please stay healthy.

=SELL=
NORTH AMERICA: Lisa Raymond, USA
...time catches up with everyone eventually.

SOUTH AMERICA: Rossana de los Rios, PAR
...well, I had to pick someone, and DLR pulled the short straw.

ASIA/PACIFIC: Rennae Stubbs, AUS
...TV is calling, though she might be able to balance the two for a little while longer (of course, that's exactly what I said a year ago, and while she DID go title-less for the first time since 1991, Stubbs was still a Top 5 doubles player in '09).

AFRICA/MIDDLE EAST: Tzipora Obziler, ISR
...yeah, I know she's already retired. So, unless she's got a little Kimiko in her, your nest egg might be in danger if you held on to your Obziler stock for too long.

RUSSIA: Dinara Safina
...2009 was probably the best chance she's ever going to have to win a slam (ditto for Jelena Jankovic).

REST OF EUROPE: Kim Clijsters, BEL
...after she won the Open in '05, she didn't seem to really care if she won another slam. After winning her first in KC II, might the same happen? I know I won't be investing any money in the possibility that that WON'T be the case again.

=HAVE A LITTLE FAITH IN THE INVESTMENT=
NORTH AMERICA: Bethanie Mattek-Sands, USA
...2009 was a year of change for newlywed Bethanie. Maybe after getting her bearings, she can finally go about trying to win that first WTA singles title in 2010.

SOUTH AMERICA: Betina Jozami, ARG
...she'll forget about blowing that Fed Cup match against Oudin. Some day.

ASIA/PACIFIC: Marina Erakovic/NZL & Casey Dellacqua/AUS
...after their promising careers were interrupted by injuries this season, it'll be a case of going back to the grind in '10.

AFRICA/MIDDLE EAST: Julia Glushko, ISR
...she looked promising in '08, but her coach made more news complaining about Gronert than his charge did on the court in '09.

RUSSIA: Nadia Petrova
...there are still some big moments left in those aching bones yet. Hopefully.

REST OF EUROPE: Agnes Szavay, HUN
...a series of bad days and bad draws forestalled the Valkyrie's seemingly-accomplished '09 return to form. In 2010, maybe Szavay will be able to maintain her momentum all season long.

All for now.



2009 SEASON REVIEW/OFFSEASON EDITIONS OF WTA BACKSPIN:
...Revolving Doors - 2010 WTA Guide Preview
...2009 Regional Honors & '10 All-Intriguing Team and Market Tips
...The Decade's Best: Top 25 Players & Final Awards
...Backspin Awards (coming soon)
...Ms. Backspin (coming soon)
...WTA Yearbook (coming soon)
...BACKSPIN "WHAT IF?" SPECIAL (featuring "Anna Kournikova") (this offseason)
...ITF Backspin (every Monday throughout November & December)
...2010 Preview Series (in December)

Read more...