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Sunday, August 15, 2021

Wk.29- Forza Magnifique!

After years of insistent knocking, Camila Giorgi finally kicks the door in.








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*WEEK 29 CHAMPIONS*
MONTREAL (QUEBEC), CAN (WTA 1000/Hard Court Outdoor)
S: Camila Giorgi/ITA def. Karolina Pliskova/CZE 6-3/7-5
D: Gaby Dabrowski/Luisa Stefani (CAN/BRA) def. Darya Jurak/Andreja Klepac (CRO/SLO) 6-3/6-4


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PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Camila Giorgi/ITA
...the 29-year old Italian has often been a threat to post a great result in a big event, but until this week she'd never actually *done* it.



With a 2018 Wimbledon QF standing alone as her best big event result until her final eight run in Tokyo a few weeks ago, Giorgi rode her Olympic momentum (which included a 3rd Round win over Karolina Pliskova) all the way to the Montreal title, a journey which not only included her biggest SF and final results (her other eight tour finals, in which she'd gone a disappointing 2-6 after failing to convert MP more than once, had come at the International/250 level) but also victories over four seeded players (#9 Elise Mertens, #7 Petra Kvitova, #15 Coco Gauff and #4 Pliskova yet again) as well as Nadia Podoroska and Jessie Pegula.

Giorgi had lost to Pegula in the '19 Washington final, as well as to Pliskova in the '14 Linz championship match, so her success in Quebec this week serves as something of a "make-up" for all (well, a few) of the times the big-hitting firebrand has come up "just short" or failed to use one big in-tournament result as a stepping stone to something greater in the rounds that followed. This time she did just that, sweeping through the competition while dropping just one set (vs. Pegula/SF) all week long.



The win over Pliskova gives Giorgi three victories over the Czech this summer alone (w/ Eastbourne 1r) and provides the majority of her four (a career best) Top 10 wins this season (two in Eastbourne, then the most recent pair over Pliskova). The title run will allow Giorgi to more than slice her singles ranking in half, as she'll rocket up from a (too low) #71 to a more acceptable (based on her ability) #34.
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RISERS: Jessie Pegula/USA and Ons Jabeur/TUN
...Pegula remains one of the best (though somewhat overlooked) Bannerette stories of 2021. After ending 2020 at #62, the 27-year old has been a consistent threat since the season's opening weeks, notching Top 10 wins on three different surfaces while camping out on the doorstep of the Top 25.

In Montreal, Pegula ran off a string of wins over Anett Kontaveit, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, Danielle Collins (ending her 12-match winning streak) and Ons Jabeur (who'd served for the win in the 2nd set), all in three sets against players who've either won or reached finals this season. She finally came up short in her fifth three-setter of the week, falling to Camila Giorgi in the SF. The loss prevented Pegula from reaching her first final since Auckland '20, as well as kept her from another potentially fateful meeting with Karolina Pliskova, against whom she's 4-0 this season.

Still, Pegula's overall result was the best of her career at a 1000 level or better event (after an AO QF, plus three other 1000 QF since last summer). But even with a handful of impressive wins and now a 21-8 hard court record in '21, her lack of an appearance in a final continues to prevent this from truly being declared a "breakout" season. Pegula's lone tour singles title came in Washington two years ago, and all of her three career finals have come on the lower-tier International (now 250) level. She'll pass Collins in the rankings on Monday, becoming the #5-ranked U.S. woman, but will remain one spot off her career high of #25 (but since that's currently held by the now-retired Kiki Bertens, Pegula is sort of "unofficially" already the 25th-ranked player on tour).



Having already reached her second career slam QF (Wimbledon) and become the tour's first Tunisian/Arab/North African singles champion this season, Jabeur matched her career-best WTA 1000 result ('20 Dubai/Cincy-NYC) with a QF run in Montreal that saw her knock off Clara Burel, Dasha Kasatkina (her Birmingham final victim) and defending '19 champ Bianca Andreescu in an epic three-setter under the lights that included two medical time-outs (both by the Canadian), two rain delays and over two and a half hours of play.

Against Pegula in the QF, Jabeur won the 1st set and served for the match in the 2nd, coming within two points of the win before the Bannerette surged back to win her fourth straight three-setter of the week.

Jabeur will add yet another "first to..." to her career resume on Monday, as she'll make her Top 20 debut.

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SURPRISE: Katerina Siniakova/CZE
...Siniakova's surge in the wake of doubles partner Barbora Krejcikova's rise (now into the Top 10) continued in Montreal, where the Czech knocked off both Alona Ostapenko (2-3 since her Eastbourne title run, with three straight losses) and Garbine Muguruza. The latter win over the Spaniard was Siniakova's second Top 10 win of the season. She took the 1st set in her 3rd Round match against Sara Sorribes Tormo, but ultimately lost in three.

15-6 since mid-May, Siniakova will be up to #53 on Monday. She hasn't ranked inside the Top 50 in nearly two years.
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VETERANS: Karolina Pliskova/CZE and Victoria Azarenka/BLR
...all of a sudden, Pliskova is turning out to have a pretty darn good year on the whole, after all. But she'll really need to do something about being title-less for her season to truly have any sort of standing.

After a slow first half of the season that made it appear as if new coach Sascha Bajin's firing was simply a matter of when rather than if, Pliskova has slowly but surely turned around her '21 campaign. From her Rome final run until this week's runner-up result in Montreal, with a Wimbledon final in between, the Czech has now gone a combined 17-7 (after a barely-mediocre 10-8 start). After having dropped out of the Top 10 for the first time in 230 weeks prior to her SW19 performance, she's now set to return to the Top 5 in the coming week.

In Montreal, Pliskova prevailed in a 3rd set TB over Donna Vekic to kick off her week, then followed up with victories over Amanda Anisimova, Sara Sorribes Tormo (sweeping the final ten games to win in straights) and Aryna Sabalenka in the semifinals in an improvement upon her three-set win over the Belarusian in the semis in London, reaching her first non-Rome WTA 1000 final since she won in Cincinnati in 2016 prior to her maiden appearance in a slam final at that summer's U.S. Open.

One likely felt that Pliskova breathed a sigh of relief when Jessie Pegula (4-0 vs. the Czech in' 21) lost her semifinal match to Camila Giorgi on Saturday, until it's realized that Pliskova was also 0-2 vs. the Italian this season. Giorgi improved to 3-0 with her straight sets win in the final, but the Pliskova/Bajin '21 "long game" continues to march forward with Flushing Meadows just around the corner. The Czech will move to #4 on Monday, her highest rank since last September.

Meanwhile, Azarenka has experienced in 2021 the sort of injury-marred (four walkovers, and even a w/d from an exhibition in Washington last week) and uneven (she's still peppered her ledger with some good results, including SF in Doha and Berlin, and Round of 16 runs in Miami and Paris) campaign that has been (often at best) her lot in recent seasons.

Last summer, though, the Belarusian burst into the Restart and ultimately strung together eleven straight wins (claiming the Cincinnati-at-NYC title and reaching the U.S. Open final) and climbed back into the Top 20 for the first time since early 2017.

Still ranked #15, but with a slew of points to defend in the coming weeks, Azaranka recorded her biggest QF result of the season in Montreal, getting wins over Sorana Cirstea and Maria Sakkari (rallying from a break down in the 1st and 3rd sets to record her second Top 20 win of '21) before eventually falling in the final eight to countrywoman Aryna Sabalenka.

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COMEBACK: Rebecca Marino/CAN
...Marino's return to tennis after missing nearly five years (2012-17) while dealing with depression is well-chronicled, but her on-court success in her comeback has often been spotty. She's won seven ITF crowns in the stretch, including a $60K challenger in 2019, but this season has seen some truly significant movement between the lines for the 30-year old. She qualified for the Australian Open, reaching her first slam MD since 2013 (and notching her first win since '11), and in recent weeks claimed her biggest career doubles title (WTA 125 Charleston).

In Montreal, in the MD of the event for the first time in a decade (career 0-1 MD, with four other failed qualifying attempts back to '06) via a wild card, Marino upset Madison Keys and Paula Badosa to reach the 3rd Round. They were her first career WTA 1000 MD wins.

Marino lost in her next match to top-seeded Aryna Sabalenka, but will jump into the Top 200 (#180 from #220) with the result. She hasn't ranked higher than #140 since her return, but climbed to #38 back in 2011.
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FRESH FACE: Mirjam Bjorklund/SWE
...the 23-year old Swede picked up her first challenger title of the year in the $25K in Koksijde, Belgium. The #2-ranked player in her nation behind Rebecca Peterson, Bjorklund won four straight three-set matches to reach the final, then handled Bosnia's Dea Herdželaš 7-6/6-3 to claim her seventh career ITF win and her first since 2019. It matches her biggest career singles crown. Herdželaš had previously been 4-0 in challenger finals this season.

Bjorklund, who just last month won her biggest career doubles title in the WTA 125 Bastad event, has now won her last six singles finals dating back to 2018.

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DOWN: Leylah Fernandez/CAN
...five months ago, one would have likely thought that by the time Montreal came around in the summer it might potentially serve as a home showcase for the 18-year old Fernandez. After all, while the 2020 season was something of a logistical mess, the potential that the Canadian (in '19 the RG girls champ and AO finalist) showed was a bright spot for the future. She reached her first tour singles final Acapulco and notched her maiden Top 10 win (vs. Bencic in Fed Cup) before the shutdown, then reached the 3rd Round in Paris later in the fall in her RG MD debut.

This past March, Fernandez reached and won the Monterrey title without dropping a set (def. two '21 finalists, Kristina Kucova and Viktorija Golubic, and a title winner, Sara Sorribes Tormo along the way) and seemed set to climb still higher over the course of 2021. Thus far, it hasn't happened, though.

Since that run in Mexico, Fernandez hasn't strung together back-to-back wins in a tour event (her only winning streak has been a two-victory performance in BJK Cup). Come this week in Montreal, she was still ranked #70 (having been stagnant in the rankings since emerging from Monterrey ranked #72), and Fernandez needed wild card to secure a spot in the main draw. With a potential 2nd Round match-up with #2 seed, countrywoman and '19 tournament champ Bianca Andreescu within reach, Fernandez fell in the 1st Round to #172 Harriet Dart in straight sets.



The loss drops Fernandez to 15-14 on the season, and just 7-10 since her title run.

Fernandez still has her entire career in front of her, but it appears the *next* step might have to wait until 2022.
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ITF PLAYER: Nuria Párrizas Díaz/ESP
...Párrizas Díaz is likely the most improved player of 2021 that the majority of fans have never heard of. The 30-year old Spaniard, knocked down earlier in her career with a 2015 shoulder injury after having broken the Top 300 a season earlier (out more than a year, by 2016 she was in the #700's), has built her career on the ITF circuit in recent seasons. After her post-surgery return, she won seven challenger titles in fourteen months and began to reclaim much of her lost ground. She cracked the Top 300 again in the spring of '19, and played in her first slam qualifying tournament at the Australian Open in 2020 at age 28 (she lost in the Q2), soon breaking into the Top 200 (though only for two short weeks).

This season Párrizas Díaz's climb have been close to monumental for a player at this stage of her career. While she's still failed to reach a slam MD, she's come agonizingly close with final Q-round defeats in Paris in London. But she *did* finally make her WTA tour-level MD debut, at age 29, in Bogota earlier this year, qualifying and fighting her way into her maiden QF. The Spaniard won four ITF titles over the first half of the year, at one point winning sixteen straight matches, and returned to the Top 200 in March.

Last month, she claimed her biggest title at the WTA 125 event in Bastad. After reaching another tour-level QF in Gdynia, Párrizas Díaz arrived in the U.S. for the Landisville, Pennsylvania $100K challenger this past week. All she did in the rain-ravaged event was post victories over Bannerettes Jamie Loeb and Grace Min, Brit Emma Raducanu (ret. in 1st set) and Poland's Katarzyna Kawa to reach the final. There she battled Belgian Greet Minnen until she edged out a 7-6(6)/4-6/7-6(7) win, claiming the victory in a match-up in which the champion would not only lift the trophy but also make her Top 100 debut on Monday.

Párrizas Díaz's win give her nine straight singles finals victories dating back to August '19, including six this season alone. She'll now climb from #111 into the Top 100 for the first time at #90.

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JUNIOR STAR: Oksana Selekhmeteva/RUS
...the 18-year old Russian (jr.#13) hasn't played much junior tennis in '21, but when she has she's been top level, reaching the Roland Garros girls singles semis and winning the doubles (w/ Alex Eala). Otherwise, Selekhmeteva has been busy on the ITF circuit, winning her first pro singles crown early in the season and performaning even better in doubles.

In the $60K in San Bartolomé de Tirajana, Spain, the teenager claimed her fourth '21 title, winning the event alongside fellow 18-year old Hordette Elina Avanesyan. Unseeded, the duo knocked off the #3 (1r - Richel Hogenkamp/Ana Sofia Sanchez) and #4 seeds (F - Arianne Hartono/Olivia Tjandramulia 7-5/6-2) en route to the title.

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DOUBLES: Gaby Dabrowski/Luisa Stefani, CAN/BRA
...if Dabrowski & Stefani were looking for revenge after losing in the San Jose final last week to Darya Jurak & Andreja Klepac, they got their chance for it on Sunday. Their 6-3/6-4 win over last week's champs fulfilled the wish, ending a pair of long WD final losing streaks. Both has lost six straight with various partners (Stefani 0-4 in '21), including two while pairing w/ each other (last week and Ostrava '20).

The duo knocked off #1-seeded Mertens/Sabalenka in the QF, V.Kudermetova/Rybakina in the SF, and dropped just one set all week (1st in the 1r vs. Lohoff/Voracova).



The title is Dabrowski's tenth in her WTA career, and Stefani now has three (and that Olympic Bronze, too). Dabrowski is the first Canadian to win a share of the tournament women's doubles title since Brenda Nunns & Faye Urban took the crown back in 1969 (Bianca Andreescu won the singles in the last edition in '19, of course).

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1. Montreal 3rd Rd. - Ons Jabeur def. Bianca Andreescu
...6-7(5)/6-4/6-1. Wherever these two go, a memorable match is surely on the table as a possibility. So naturally when you get them together...

Two rain delays, two medical timeouts (both from Andreescu) and 2:39 of action later, Jabeur prevailed.

Andreescu won the 1st set on her second try, after her first converted SP had been overturned on replay. It was after the set that the Canadian took her first MTO (foot). The 2nd set saw a one-hour rain delay, while a slip and fall from Andreescu precipitated a second MTO (toe). A brief rain delay came at 4-4, after which Jabeur claimed eight of the final nine games. The Canadian has still won 29 of her last 32 matches in North America.

After the match, Andreescu walked up to the line of "pulling an Osaka," but since she actually showed up to express her frustration it's clear that she did *not* actually do that. It'll likely be one of the few things she *won't* pull or injure during what remains of this season.

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2. Montreal 3rd Rd. - Jessie Pegula def. Danielle Collins
...6-4/3-6/6-4. Collins goes out, ending her 12-match winning streak, but only after threatening an eleventh hour victory push as she closed from 5-2 to 5-5 in the 3rd before Pegula was finally able to put her away.

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3. Montreal 1st Rd. - Liudmila Samsonova def. Elena Rybakina
...6-4/5-7/6-4. Rybakina's lack of closing ability continues to dog her, as she dropped the final three games of the 1st set, then four of five to end the 3rd. She's gone 1-4 since winning her QF match in Tokyo, and she had to come back from a set down against Claire Liu to get that one win this week. She'd been 14-4 prior to her current dip.

And, by the way, WTA... the tour website should really list the Tokyo Bronze match (Svitolina/Rybakina) in the Matches Played lists. The rest of the Olympic matches didn't count in the rankings, either, but *they* are included. The ITF site doesn't have this problem.
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4. Montreal 2nd Rd. - Danielle Collins def. Simona Halep
...2-6/6-4/6-4. Halep, with her inactivity having knocked her out of the Top 10 for the first time since 2014, held a break lead twice (2-1 and 3-2) in the 3rd in her first action in three months.

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5. Montreal 3rd Rd. - Victoria Azarenka def. Maria Sakkari
...6-4/3-6/7-6(2). Taking both the 1st and 3rd (4-2) sets after falling down a break, Azarenka posts her biggest QF result of '21 and picks up her second Top 20 win of the season.
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6. Montreal 1st Rd. - Rebecca Marino def. Madison Keys
Montreal 2nd Rd. - Rebecca Marino def. Paula Badosa 1-6/7-5/6-4
...#220 Marino's wins over #26 Keys and #31 Badosa were her biggest since defeating a then-#15 Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in Luxembourg in 2011.

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7. Montreal QF - Jessie Pegula def. Ons Jabuer
...1-6/7-6(4)/6-0. Jabeur was up a break in the 2nd and served with a 6-1/5-4 lead (getting as close as two points from the win), only to see Pegula win her fourth straight three-setter of the week with a love 3rd.

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8. Montreal 2nd Rd. - Johanna Konta def. Elina Svitolina
...3-6/6-3/6-2. After saying that her 3rd place finish in Tokyo would serve as an "inspiration" to her, Svitolina loses in her first post-Olympic outing.

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9. Montreal QF - Aryna Sabalenka def. Victoria Azarenka
...6-2/6-4. When Fed/BJK Cup teammates (and reigning Berlin doubles champions) meet.

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10. Montreal 1st Rd. - Sloane Stephens def. Dayana Yastremska
...6-4/1-6/6-4. Stephens rallies from 2-0 down in the 1st, and 4-2 in the 3rd. Yastremska had four BP for a 5-2 lead in the decider.
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11. Montreal 1st Rd. - Johanna Konta def. Zhang Shuai
...4-6/5-2 ret. Playing in her first match since contracting Covid in June, Konta gets the *last* player she faced (Zhang in the Nottingham final).

The Brit withdrew in the 3rd Round with a knee injury.
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12. Montreal 1st Rd. - Coco Gauff def. Anastasija Sevastova
...6-1/6-4. After going 0-3 vs. the Latvian vet -- at the '20 US, and '21 Miami and Eastbourne -- Gauff finally gets on the board. After getting a retirement (after 5 games vs. Potapova) and walkover (Konta) in her next two matches, Gauff fell in straights to Giorgi in the QF.

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13. $100K Landisville 1st Rd. - Ekaterine Gorgodze def. CoCo Vandeweghe
...6-7(3)/6-3/1-0 ret. Thread.

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14. $60K San Bartolomé de Tirajana ESP Final - Arantxa Rus def. Mayar Sherif
...6-4/6-2. A week after reaching the tour-level Cluj-Napoca final, Sherif drops down a level and reaches another on the challenger circuit. Unfortunately for her, she lost again, this time to Rus, the 30-year old Dutch veteran who has already reached a pair of WTA 125 finals (0-2) in 2021.

The title qualifies as the biggest of Rus' 25 career ITF wins, worth slightly more than the then-$50K level crown she won in Osprey, Florida way back in 2012.

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15. Cincinnati Q2 - Leylah Fernandez def. Gabriela Ruse
...6-2/6-0. While her week in Montreal may have started (and ended) badly, Fernandez has begun her *next* week quite well with a two-win qualifying run in the Western & Southern Open's return to Ohio after being forced to be held on the USTA grounds in Flushing Meadows last summer.

0-3 in WTA 1000 MD matches in her career, the Canadian (who got into the Montreal MD via a wild card after falling in 1000 qualifying in Miami, Madrid and Rome earlier this season) gets another chance for a momentum-instilling result as she tries to close out 2021 with the same sort of late surge she did in 2020.
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1. Montreal Final - Camila Giorgi def. Karolina Pliskova
...6-3/7-5. Pliskova had quite the conundrum when it came to potential opponents in the final, as she was already a combined 0-6 against semifinal challengers Giorgi (0-2) and Jessie Pegula (0-4) before she even had a chance to play for the title against one of them in Quebec. As it turned out, the Italian was able to pull off the '21 trifecta, but it may have been a Catch-22 situation for the Czech under any circumstances.

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2. Montreal SF - Karolina Pliskova def. Aryna Sabalenka
...6-4/6-4. Want to know what ticked-off frustration looks like after the same opponent knocks you out of both Wimbledon and Montreal semifinals over a five-week stretch? Well, just look at Sabalenka after her latest big stage loss to Pliskova. She had a shot to rise to #2 in the rankings this week, but will remain less than 150 points behind Naomi Osaka.

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So I guess AP is now practicing the idea of placing key facts in an article that *should* be in the first paragraph all the way down in the *next to last* paragraph (which used to be sometimes cut for space in actual newspapers, it should be noted)?




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=MONTREAL, QUEBEC (CANADA)=





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*2021 SLAM-WTAF/1000/OLYMPIC CHAMPIONS*
Australian Open - Naomi Osaka, JPN
Dubai - Garbine Muguruza, ESP
Indian Wells - POSTPONED
Miami - Ash Barty, AUS
Madrid - Aryna Sabalenka, BLR
Rome - Iga Swiatek, POL
Roland Garros - Barbora Krejcikova, CZE
Wimbledon - Ash Barty, AUS
Olympics - Belinda Bencic, SUI
Canada - Camila Giorgi, ITA
[doubles]
Australian Open - Elise Mertens/Aryna Sabalenka, BEL/BLR
Dubai - Alexa Guarachi/Darija Jurak, CHI/CRO
Indian Wells - POSTPONED
Miami - Shuko Aoyama/Ena Shibahara, JPN/JPN
Madrid - Barbora Krejcikova/Katerina Siniakova, CZE/CZE
Rome - Sharon Fichman/Giuliana Olmos, CAN/MEX
Roland Garros - Barbora Krejcikova/Katerina Siniakova, CZE/CZE
Wimbledon - Hsieh Su-wei/Elise Mertens, TPE/BEL
Olympics - Barbora Krejcikova/Katerina Siniakova, CZE
Canada - Gaby Dabrowski/Luisa Stefani, CAN/BRA

*2021 WTA FINALS*
5 - Ash Barty, AUS (4-1)
4 - Barbora Krejcikova, CZE (3-1)
4 - Dasha Kasatkina, RUS (2-2)
3 - Aryna Sabalenka, BLR (2-1)
3 - Belinda Bencic, SUI (1-2)
3 - Garbine Muguruza, ESP (1-2)
3 - KAROLINA PLISKOVA, CZE (0-3)

*2021 WTA DOUBLES FINALS*
5...Krejcikova/Siniakova, CZE/CZE (4-1)
4...Aoyama/Shibahara, JPN/JPN (4-0)
4...JURAK/KLEPAC, CRO/SLO (2-2)
4...Melichar/Schuurs, USA/NED (2-2)
3...Bouzkova/Hradecka, CZE/CZE (2-1)
3...Carter/Stefani, USA/BRA (0-3)
[individuals]
5 (4-1) = Barbora Krejcikova, CZE
5 (4-1) = Katerina Siniakova, CZE
5 (3-2) = DARIJA JURAK, CRO
5 (2-3) = Demi Schuurs, NED
5 (1-4) = LUISA STEFANI, BRA
4 (2-2) = Desirae Krawczyk, USA
4 (4-0) = Shuko Aoyama, JPN
4 (4-0) = Ena Shibahara, JPN
4 (2-2) = ANDREJA KLEPAC, SLO
4 (2-2) = Nicole Melichar, USA

*MOST WTA SF in 2021*
5...Ash Barty, AUS (4-0+W)
5...ARYNA SABALENKA, BLR (3-2)
4...Dasha Kasatkina, RUS (4-0)
4...Barbora Krejcikova, CZE (4-0)
4...Danielle Collins, USA (2-2)
4...Elise Mertens, BEL (1-2+W)
4...Paula Badosa, ESP (1-3)
4...Maria Sakkari, GRE (0-4)

*2021 $100K FINALS*
Charleston, USA (clay) - Claire Liu/USA def. Madison Brengle/USA
Bonita Springs, USA (clay) - Katie Volynets/USA def. Irina Bara/ROU
Nottingham, GBR (grass) - Alison Van Uytvanck/BEL def. Arina Rodionova/AUS
Contrexeville, FRA (clay) - Anhelina Kalinina/UKR def. Dalma Galfi/HUN
Landisville, USA (hard) - Nuria Párrizas Díaz/ESP def. Greet Minnen/BEL





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We start with "Another Day in Paradise" (Phil Collins), "Opposites Attract" (Paula Abdul and, umm) and Sinead O'Connor's imcomparable performance of the Prince-penned "Nothing Compres 2 U." Personally, I think things started to go astray from the still-classic 1980s style of music sometime in 1993. By 1996, I'm going "????" with a lot of these songs. Hey, I didn't know Michael and Janet Jackson had a song together. Holy crap... "MmmBop" was in 1997!? By 1998, Aerosmith (an act that started in 1970) was back at #1. 1999... Britney. Honesty, I appreciate Backstreet now more than I did at the time. Longevity is good. And we end up with Santana's ubiquitous "Smooth."






All for now.
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