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Monday, August 18, 2025

Wk.34- Queen City Jazda








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*WEEK 34 CHAMPIONS*
CINCINNATI, OHIO USA (WTA 1000; Hard Court Outdoor)
S: Iga Swiatek/POL def. Jasmine Paolini/ITA 7-5/6-4
D: Gaby Dabrowski/Erin Routliffe (CAN/NZL) def. Guo Hanyu/Alexandra Panova (CHN/RUS) 6-4/6-3




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[Cincinnati 3rd Rd. Wed.-Final]

PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Iga Swiatek/POL
...not allowing her loss to Clara Tauson in Montreal to turn her summer-of-'25 good vibes bad, Swiatek proceeded to head to Cincinnati and take her first title at the event (after SF finishes the last two years) without dropping a set.

After a 1 & 4 win over Anastasia Potapova to get things back on track, after a Marta Kostyuk walkover in the 3rd Round, Swiatek ran off straight sets wins over Sorana Cirstea, Anna Kalinskaya and Elena Rybakina (improving to 4-0 this season vs. her former nemesis) to reach the final for the third time in her last four tournaments after having gone over a year without reaching that stage in any.

With Jasmine Paolini nipping at her heels throughout the final, Swiatek routinely turned back all of the Italian's short-lived moments in which she threatened to put the outcome of either set in jeopardy, winning 7-5/6-4 to grab her 24th career tour-level title. Her wins over Rybakina and Paolini made Cincinnati Swiatek's first multi-Top 10 win event since her Roland Garros title run last year (she had no Top 10 wins en route to her Wimbledon championship last month).

With the additional rankings points, Swiatek reclaims the #2 ranking from Coco Gauff, putting her on the opposite end of the draw from defending champ Aryna Sabalenka, and resumes her it-seemed-unlikely-two-months-ago campaign to quite possibly turn 2025 into a Player of the Year season. Pssst... she's now only one wins -- 50 vs. 49 -- and one title (3 to 2, but is +1 in majors) behind Sabalenka when it comes to season totals.


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RISERS: Elena Rybakina/KAZ and Anna Kalinskaya/RUS
...Rybakina, with Stefano Vukov (next to Davide Sanguinetti) back in the coaching box following his suspension, reclaimed *some* of her recently-lacking big moment mettle in Cincinnati.

If her first three matches -- vs. Renata Zarazua, Elise Mertens and Madison Keys -- Rybakina rallied from a set down to win in three, twice avoiding her recent albatross (3rd set TBs) by taking 7-5 deciders, and handling Keys 6-2 in another final set. A 6-1/6-4 win over #1 Aryna Sabalenka followed in likely Rybakina's best performance of the season.

The run carried over into the SF vs. Iga Swiatek, as the Kazakh got off to a quick start, but once Rybakina found herself serving for the 1st set her game and mentality reverted back to the level that has cost her so many big moments this season, including SF losses in Washington and Montreal vs. the eventual champions in which she served for the match. She was broken when serving at 5-4 vs. Swiatek, and then couldn't keep up with the Pole. She lost the 1st set without winning another game, then failed to convert BP chances to get back on serve mid-way through the 2nd (losing four straight points in an Iga hold). With a straight sets loss, Rybakina fell to 0-4 vs. Swiatek in '25, and 1-5 in semifinals this season.

If Rybakina had managed to prevail vs. Swiatek, Cincinnati would have been the first tournament in her career in which she recorded three Top 10 wins.

Afterward, Tennis Channel commentator Lindsay Davenport stated that Rybakina's week reinstalled her as a "real threat" to win the U.S. Open... but did it? If she'd gotten past Swiatek, yes, but after seeing her succumb to the big moment again it's difficult to put the Kazakh anywhere near the handful of *potential* winners in New York, where even a second week run has eluded her throughout her career (she's never gotten past the 3rd Rd. in a buzzy atmosphere that has, to say the least, a very "un-Rybakina" feel to it).



Coming into Cincinnati with a 6-2 mark on summer hard courts, with a final in Washington and 3rd Round in Montreal under her belt, Kalinskaya strung together three more wins to reach the QF.

After a victory over Peyton Stearns, the Hordette recorded her third Top 10 win of the season with an upset of Amanda Anisimova, then rallied from a set down vs. countrywoman Ekaterina Alexandrova, finally getting her first win in the series in her seventh try after taking a 2nd set TB and then dominating a 6-1 3rd in a late night match in which her nerves were tested (and she became a bit testy... testy, at least by Kalinskaya's usual standard) by loud, drunken spectators.

With the late finish of her 4th Rounder, Kalinskaya didn't get to sleep until after 4 a.m. on Thursday morning, then spoke against being scheduled for a pre-noon match on Friday, stating that she should have remained in the night session cycle with her recovery time so curtailed. It was an understandable complaint, with a slight qualifier. At least she got a full playing day between matches, unlike the four women who had to follow-up their Thursday day/night 4r matches with a QF on Friday. Considering the circumstances, she might have at least been given a break and scheduled in either the #2 or #3 QF match slot (not sure why they scheduled an Iga Swiatek match so early in the day, anyway).

As it turned out, Kalinskaya fell 3 & 4 to Swiatek first-up on Friday. The Russian had won their only previous meeting in the 2024 Dubai semifinals.
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SURPRISE: Varvara Gracheva/FRA
...a Top 40 player as recently as the start of last season, 2025 has seen Gracheva slip outside the Top 100, a dividing line which she's finished on "the good side" of in every season-ending rankings this decade.

Having achieved her first '25 SF earlier this summer at Eastbourne (as a qualifier), the Pastry made it through qualifying again in Cincinnati. In the MD, she strung together four more wins over Katie Volynets, Sofia Kenin, Karolina Muchova and Ella Seidel to reach her first career 1000 QF. She fell there to Veronika Kudermetova, her former countrywoman, but will return to the Top 100 next week.

Whether this momentum will help Gracheva in New York is unknown, considering her Eastbourne semi was followed up by a 1st Round exit at Wimbledon. Usually a good early-round slam player, as she notched at least one win in eleven majors from 2020-24, Gracheva has collected just one *total* win (at the AO) in slam play this season.


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VETERANS: Jasmine Paolini/ITA and Magda Linette/POL
...after starring in slam play in '24, Paolini's best singles results this season have come in 1000 events. After a previous SF in Miami and title run in Rome, the Italian added her second '25 final in Cincinnati after recording the biggest (ranking-wise) victory of her career.

After a two-TB straight sets win over Maria Sakkari, Paolini added additional victories over Ashlyn Krueger, Barbora Krejcikova and #2 Coco Gauff, the latter coming against her highest-ranked conquered opponent yet (w/ her third win over Gauff this season alone). Paolini could have gotten out of the SF in straights vs. Veronika Kudermetova, but was forced to win it in three when the Russian took the 2nd set after the Italian had served for the match at 5-4.

In the Monday final against Iga Swiatek, Paolini fell to 0-6 in their head-to-head, but had chances in both sets, including leading 3-0 in the 1st, and getting within two points of an even bigger lead at 30/30 on the Pole's serve at 3-1. After breaking Swiatek when she served for the set at 5-4, Paolini couldn't back it up and dropped serve in the following game. In the 2nd, Paolini had two BP chances at 3-4 down to get things back to even, only to drop four straight points as Swiatek put away a 7-5/6-4 win.

Paolini also reached the doubles SF with Sara Errani, but some fairly obtuse scheduling seemed to lead to the Italians *maybe* going through the motions in a Saturday *night* match with Paolini's singles SF set for Sunday afternoon, and the prospect of a doubles final meaning she'd have to play twice on either Sunday or Monday because, you know, (apparently) a week and a half just isn't long enough to complete a tournament without having matches pile up in the final two days.



Linette's 4th Round finish in Cincinnati pulled the 33-year old out of a 1-5 stretch that began with a defeat in the Nottingham semis, her deepest run in an event all season. Along the way, she posted wins over Rebecca Sramkova and Jessie Pegula (for her second Top 10 in '25, w/ both coming on U.S. hard courts after her win over Coco Gauff in Miami). She went out at the hands of Veronika Kudermetova just short of her fifth QF result of the season.

Linette had three previous 3rd Rd.+ results in 1000 events in '25, with her Miami QF and a pair of 3rd Rounds in Doha and Rome.


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COMEBACK: Veronika Kudermetova/RUS
...after having lost in the 3rd Round at the last three 1000 events on the schedule (Madrid-Rome-Montreal), in Cincinnati, Kudermetova put together her first SF result at that level since her consecutive semis in 2023 in Madrid/Rome.

The Hordette posted wins over Suzan Lamens, Belinda Bencic and Clara Tauson (coming back from a set and a break deficit vs. the Dane) to reach her first 1000 4th Round in two years, then added additional victories over Magda Linette and Varvara Gracheva. She fell in three sets to Jasmine Paolini (after the Italian had served for the win in the 2nd) a round short of the final, but the run produced her first singles SF of the season and will propel Kudermetova back into the Top 30. She's 7-2 on summer hard courts.


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ITF PLAYERS: Teodora Kostovic/SRB and Jeline Vandromme/BEL
...in Kuršumlijska Banja, Serbia, 18-year old Kostovic grabbed her first career pro title in a $75K challenger, defeating Lina Gjorcheska 7-5/6-3 in the final.

The Serb, a girls' singles Roehampton champ (2024) and junior quarterfinalist at Wimbledon the last two years, previously made her tour-level MD debut in 2025 after making her way through qualifying in Madrid (w/ a Top 100 win over Gabriela Ruse), as well as seeing her first BJK Cup action. She reached her first pro final in a challenger in May.

Kostovic, 29-11 in pro events in '25, will crack the Top 250 in the new rankings.



In Monastir (TUN), 17-year old Vandromme continued her challenger hot streak, winning her third straight title and extending her winning run to 17 matches. In this week's event, she didn't lose a set, losing just twelve total games in five matches (she dropped two or fewer games in seven of ten sets) and wrapping up the $15K title with a 6-2/6-1 victory in the final over Alena Kovackova.

The Waffle will rise from outside the Top 750 to inside the Top 500.


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JUNIOR STAR: Valentina Mediorreal Arias/COL
...the 18-year old Colombian takes her biggest career junior title, claiming the top spot in Ascunsion (PAR) in the J300 Junior Pan American Games with a 7-6/6-4 win in the final over Sol Ailin Larraya Guidi (ARG). The #5 seed, Mediorreal Arias defeated the top three seeds in the event in consecutive rounds in the QF (#3), SF (#2) and Final (#1 Larraya).


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DOUBLES: Gaby Dabrowski/Erin Routliffe, CAN/NZL
...Dabrowski & Routliffe combined for their sixth tour-level crown in their eleventh final appearance together since first teaming up in 2023, a run which famously began with them winning the U.S. Open title two summers ago.

The pair won back-to-back MTB vs. Olmos/Sutjiadi and L.Kichenok/Perez in Cincinnati, then handled Guo/Panova 4 & 3 in the final on Sunday. It's their second title this season, the 19th in Dabrowski's career and #11 for Routliffe (who's won three in '25, including one a few weeks ago in Washington w/ Asia Muhammad).


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WHEELCHAIR: Jinte Bos/NED
...in lieu of *any* big pre-U.S. Open hard court warm-up event (i.e. Series 1 or higher) in the month leading into play at Flushing Meadows, I'll dip back to two weekends ago to belatedly highlight a Series 2 event wrapped up in Gross-Siegharts, Austria on August 10.

In that event, 22-year old Dutch player Bos (world #12) picked up her first title of the year via a three-set win in the final over veteran countrywoman Jiske Griffioen.

@jinte.tennis


I'm not sure why, but the *only* Series 1 wheelchair event contested between Wimbledon and the U.S. Open came in Belgium from July 23-27, and it was on clay. Diede de Groot won that event. From that point on, *zero* Series 1 hard court events will be played prior to the Open, with the only two events in August above the Futures level being the above S2 in Austria and another S2 in College Park (Maryland) during the first week of the play at the U.S. Open (w/ the wheelchair competition starting up in week two).

As noted before, with the USTA *so* wanting to "beef up" qualifying week at Flushing Meadows -- including with the upcoming MX thing this week, which is more "show" than "major event" -- it would seem to be a good spot to hold a Series 1 wheelchair competition prior to the start of WC slam MD play at the Open. There certainly seems to be a big void waiting (and needing) to be filled.
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[Cincinnati 3rd Rd. Wed.-Final]

1. Cincinnati 4th Rd. - Elena Rybakina def. Madison Keys
...6-7(3)/6-4/6-2. Rybakina gets her first Top 10 win since February, winning her third straight three-setter in Cincy (by, thankfully, not having go to a deciding TB in any of them).


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2. Cincinnati QF - Elena Rybakina def. Aryna Sabalenka
...6-1/6-4. Rybakina's hits keep coming, hard and fast.

Rybakina's win over Sabalenka is the seventh #1 win of her career (third vs. Sabalenka, w/ the other four against Swiatek), all coming since the start of the 2023 season. The result makes this just the third tournament of the Kazakh's career -- w/ Dubai 2020, and Indian Wells 2023 -- in which she's recorded multiple Top 10 wins.


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3. Cincinnati 3rd Rd. - Magda Linette def. Jessie Pegula
...7-6(5)/3-6/6-3. In one of two 3rd Rounders pushed back a day due to rain, Linette picks up her second Top 10 win of the year (tying her career high in a single season, w/ 2021), while Pegula falls to 2-4 since winning the Bad Homburg title before Wimbledon.

Pegula's Bad Homburg final opponent, Iga Swiatek, has since gone 14-1.
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4. Cincinnati SF - Iga Swiatek def. Elena Rybakina
...7-5/6-3. After finally finding her way past pressure moments throughout the opening rounds in Cincinnati, Rybakina fell into her previous pattern vs. Swiatek, losing to the Pole for the fourth time in four meetings this season (she'd been 4-2 before '25).

Rybakina registered the first break of the match mid-way into the 1st set, and served for the match lead at 5-4, only to then pull back on her shots and serve and allow Swiatek the chance to seize control. She did, and Rybakina didn't win another game in the set. It marks the third consecutive SF this summer in which she's lost a set that she'd had on her racket in her own service game.

After that display, a 6-2 Iga set seemed on tap for the 2nd, and it very nearly happened, if not for Rybakina holding from love/40 and 15/40 late in the set, including saving two MP on serve at 5-2. After Rybakina won her third game of the 2nd, Swiatek served out the win to reach her first Cincinnati final.


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5. Cincinnati QF - Jasmine Paolini def. Coco Gauff
...2-6/6-4/6-3. In a match that was hardly a work of art (the two combined for 100+ UE -- 62 from Gauff, w/ 16 DF, and 44 from Paolini, who needed just *7* winners), Paolini came out on top of a 3rd set where the momentum traded off between the two.



After turning her ankle in the opening game of the 3rd, Paolini took a break lead and held GP for 4-1. But Gauff got the break, and seemed to have turned yet another messy match in her favor. Tied up at 3-3, she led love/30 on the Italian's serve, but couldn't get the break to surge ahead. Paolini won 11 of 12 points down the stretch, taking a love/40 lead in game 8 before breaking to go up 5-3. She then served out the victory, completing a sweep of the final three games.

Even with her scoreboard domination in the final games of the match, Paolini still fell in behind Gauff when it came to total points won. Coco led 86-85 on the night.



Afterward, Gauff dropped a persistent truth.



Thing is, Coco probably hasn't had what might be turned "great" season. She's still having issues with her serve, and overall consistency, and has won just one singles title. But it was at Roland Garros, and she'll head to Flushing Meadows as one of a small handful of legitimate "favorites" to win the title there. Even with her odd-looking summer, similar to Swiatek's entire year, Gauff still might end up making 2025 a *two*-major title season.
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6. Cleveland 1st Rd. - Eva Lys def. Maya Joint
...6-4/6-4. Well, Joint's week-before-a-slam run of great results ended this weekend in The Land.

We'll see if this changes her fortunes at Flushing Meadows. The Aussie got her only career slam MD win in New York last year after a successful qualifying run the prior week, but has gone 0-3 in slam 1st Rounds this year after reaching her first tour-level SF (pre-AO), sweeping s/d titles (pre-RG) and winning another tour singles title (pre-SW19), respectively, in the weeks directly leading into 2025's first three majors.
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7. Cincinnati SF - Gao Hanyu/Alexandra Panova def. Sara Errani/Jasmine Paolini
...6-3/6-2. Cincinnati didn't sink to the depths that was the horrific scheduling in Montreal/Toronto, but what were they thinking with the late-stage women's doubles?

While the U.S. Open's mixed monstrosity has pushed singles stars at the expense of doubles players, it feels like Cincy's scheduling discouraged women's singles players from also playing doubles. For example, Paolini reached both the s/d semis, then had to play her WD match *last* on Saturday in an evening match, with the singles SF set the following Sunday afternoon.

I don't know if the schedule played a part in Errani/Paolini's (clears throat) "quick exit" or not, but the thought of going through the motions there surely helped out Paolini's singles schedule. If the Italians had won, then she would have then had to either play both the singles semi and doubles final on Sunday, or maybe two finals on Monday if they'd delayed the scheduled Sunday WD final with her needing to play twice that day instead. Poor planning or, you know, just showing no consideration at all.

Meanwhile, the tournament had both singles finals scheduled for Monday (they only got 1.5, though... with fans having to wait around in excruciating heat for a few hours in between), and they just so happened to feature multiple players who were also signed up to participate in the U.S. Open's mixed doubles exhibition-by-any-other-name, which begins its money grab with 1st Round matches on *Tuesday.* Not that that thing doesn't deserve to be wrecked and made more of a joke than it already is.

Hmmm, after weeks of Thursday finals wrapped around Thursday starts and match-less days combined with bumper-to-bumper traffic in multiple cities at the end and beginning of events, it's almost as if it might not be a good idea to turn the summer hard court season into a never-ending merry-go-round where players are violently thrown off rather than for the ride to stop for even a single moment to allow a brief moment of sanity.

But if anyone expects saner heads to prevail, well, just remember we're talking about the sport of tennis. It'll probably get worse before it gets even a little better.
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[Cincinnati 3rd Rd. Wed.-Final]

1. Cincinnati 3rd Rd. - Veronika Kudermetova def. Clara Tauson
...3-6/7-6(4)/6-4. In a 3rd Round match delayed a day due to rain, Tauson held a set and 2-0 lead, as well as a mini-break edge at 3-0 in the 2nd set TB. But Kudermetova held on, and even overcame any possible momentum shift during another short suspension of play with her holding a 5-3 lead in the 3rd.

The win ended Kudermetova's run of 3rd Round losses in 1000 events at three ('25 Madrid, Rome and Montreal), as she reached her first 1000 Round of 16 in more than two years.


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2. $15K Monastir TUN Final - Alena Kovackova/Jana Kovackova def. Iva Ivanova/Jeline Vandromme
...7-5/6-2. Alena lost to Vandromme in the singles final, but two Kovackova sisters are better than one. The Crusher pair defeated Vandromme & Ivanova in straights in the doubles final, picking up their second pro title together this season.

The Czech sisters reached the RG girls' doubles final this past spring.
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An early look at the "props," with some tweaking likely and maybe an addition or two (or subraction) coming after the draw is set...



U.S. OPEN "PROP PICK" PREDICTIONS
1. The winner will be a former U.S. Open singles champion. As of now, those who meet the qualifications in the MD (to widely varying degrees of "legitimacy" as far as winning the titles goes): Sabalenka, Swiatek, Gauff, Raducanu, Osaka and V.Williams (w/ maybe Andreescu and, I guess, still possibly Stephens).
2. I'm eyeing a more "chalky" tournament at Flushing Meadows than usual, with *both* finalists being former U.S. Open winners, and at least three Top 6 seeds in the semifinals. Three are clear favorites for this pick (Sabalenka, Iga, Coco), with the likes of Keys probably *looking* like more of a possibility than either Pegula or Andreeva, based on recent form/results.
3. At least six Top 10 seeds will reach the QF. Depending on the draw, this might get bumped up to 7, or down to 5. Whichever way, with just five it'd still be more in the final eight in NYC since 2016 (since 2017: 2-2-2-3-4-4-4-4), with six the most since 2010 (2010-16: 6-4-5-4-2-3-5), or with seven the most since 2005 (2005-09: 7-5-5-5-3). The most Top 10ers in the QF this century is seven, with it happening four times (2000,'01,'02 and '05).
4. Dark Horse: Hmmm... I'm not sure I'll go with one here, but if I do (though she seems almost *too* obvious) I suppose Mboko would qualify (we know what happened in NYC the last time a Canadian teen won in Canada, right? Hint: 2019.). Again, this might be tweaked based on the release of the draw. Maybe a *different* Canadian title winner, returning to the scene of her origin story?
5. Elena Rybakina will lose before the QF. Could be before the 4th Round (waiting for MD for finalization), as she's never reached the Round of 16 at the Open.








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WTA mascot making another appearance (the fans must be satisfied at all costs)...




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*MOST WTA FINALS in 2025*
7 - Aryna Sabalenka (3-4)
5 - Jessie Pegula (3-2)
3 - McCartney Kessler (2-1)
3 - Elise Mertens (2-1)
3 - IGA SWIATEK (2-1)
3 - Amanda Anisimova (1-2)
3 - Coco Gauff (1-2)

*WTA HARD COURT TITLES - 2020-25*
12 - Aryna Sabalenka (3/1/0/2/4/2)
12 - IGA SWIATEK (0/1/5/3/2/1)
7 - Coco Gauff (0/0/0/4/3/0)
6 - Ash Barty (1/3/2 ret)
5 - Dasha Kasatkina (0/2/2/0/1/0)
5 - Anett Kontaveit (0/4/1/0 ret)
5 - Barbora Krejcikova (0/1/2/2/0/0)
5 - Jessie Pegula (0/0/1/2/1/1)

*MOST WTA FINALS - 2020-25*
29 - 3/3/3/6/7/7 = Sabalenka (15-14)
28 - 1/2/9/8/5/3 = SWIATEK (24-4)
18 - 5/0/3/4/5/1 = Rybakina (8-10)
17 - 1/0/2/5/4/5 = Pegula (8-9)
14 - 0/4/2/2/6/0 = Kasatkina (6-8)

*MOST WTA SF in 2025*
9 - Aryna Sabalenka (7-2)
8 - IGA SWIATEK (3-5)
6 - ELENA RYBAKINA (1-5)
5 - Jessie Pegula (5-0)
5 - JASMINE PAOLINI (2-3)
5 - Ekaterina Alexandrova (1-4)

*TOP 10 WINS 2025 (w/ #1 wins)*
8 - Sabalenka, SWIATEK
7 - Gauff(1),
6 - M.Andreeva(1)
5 - Alexandrova(1), Anisimova(1), Keys(1)

*2025 WTA DOUBLES TITLES - DUOS*
3...Errani/Paolini
2...M.Andreeva/Shnaider
2...Babos/Stefani
2...DABROWSKI/ROUTLIFFE
2...Guo/Panova
2...Jiang/Wu
2...N.Kichenok/Ninomiya
2...Muhammad/Schuurs
2...Siniakova/Townsend






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disgusting

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— LynnZ ?? (@zizij.bsky.social) August 16, 2025 at 10:36 AM


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I'll say it a thousand times -- any account of the past that only celebrates the good parts of a nation without reckoning with the bad is not what we call "history" It is propaganda, pure and simple.

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— Kevin M. Kruse (@kevinmkruse.bsky.social) August 12, 2025 at 6:29 PM


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All for now.
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