It’s finally my favorite time of the year!
The draw has been made, and players know their destiny. The WTA Official Ball took place, and the party moment is now over; the preparation tournaments have finished, with the last finals played today.
Everything is set: Wimbledon can finally start!
After a beginning of the season with a lot of absences, with which I dealt before, the entry list for the Ladies’ Singles is incredibly entertaining. Since the very first rounds, Wimbledon promises to offer popcorn matches, with the highest seeds that can be threatened by various underdogs. Moreover, it shouldn’t be forgotten that Wimbledon is probably the Grand Slam where seeds is least relevant. Indeed, history teaches us that there are some grass court specialists, that stays quite in the shadow during the rest of the year, ready to make their annual exploit at Wimbledon.
For this reason, here I deal with three players who entered the Grand Slam with the Special Ranking (SR), a formula that allows players who suffered from injuries and therefore fell down in the ranking to enter a number of tournaments using the ranking they owned before the stop, so that they own the opportunity to set themselves at high levels again. They can not be seeded, though among them there is a former finalist, and a Grand Slam champions… therefore, it seems fair to say that we should watch out for them!
The first player entering with a SR, playing just her second tournament of 2017, is former finalist Sabine Lisicki. Her big serve, capable of tons of aces, and her powerful groundstrokes make her game perfectly suitable with grass. Indeed, her results at Wimbledon are not surprising: three quarterfinals, a semifinal and, of course, that memorable final in 2013, lost against Marion Bartoli, in what seemed like a once-in-a-life opportunity to win a Grand Slam. However, the German is there to try to repeat that run, in search for that title that really seems achievable even now. In Mallorca, the first tournament she played this year, she won two good matches against Kiki Bertens and Shelby Rogers, before surrendering to her super in-form compatriot Julia Goerges.
At The Championships, she is going to come across a tough opener against youngster Ana Konjuh, a great grass player who won her only WTA tournament, in 2015, on grass. Lisicki is going to need all of her best game to overcome the Croatian. If she manages, then she could really dream of going far in the draw, with a potential third round against Cibulkova and Round 4 against Venus Williams. Potentially, she could face French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko in the quarterfinals. A curse tells that when Lisicki faces the Roland Garros champion at Wimbledon (2011 vs Li Na, 2012 vs Sharapova, 2013 vs S. Williams) she always ends up beating her…
Not really a grass court specialist, though a former Wimbledon semifinalist and a two-time Grand Slam champion: the second SR entry is Victoria Azarenka!
The Belarusian, who stopped her career to give birth to her son Leo, returned to competition in Mallorca two weeks ago. She appeared very fit, though her game was far less consistent than we were used to, and her two matches showed that she definitely should work hard her way back. After a tough opener, suspended to due obscurity, and won in the third-set tiebreak after saving MPs against Risa Ozaki, she lost in straight sets to Ana Konjuh.
Not being seeded, she could literally have faced anyone in the draw in the first round; honestly, CiCi Bellis as an opener is not that bad. Though, if she wants to overcome the young talented American, she needs to display far better tennis than in Mallorca. However, if she chose to come back at this stage – without waiting for the Us Open series, as she previously announced – that means that she feels ready to compete with the top. Certainly, not the easiest of the draws, with a potential third round against Mallorca champion Anastasia Sevastova and potential Round 4 against World #2 Simona Halep. Though, it’s nothing insurmountable for the Azarenka, who only last year won the Sunshine Double, seeming unplayable in the process.
A bigger question mark is the one regarding Sloane Stephens, who chose Wimbledon as her first tournament of 2017. After winning three titles in the first half of 2016 – two WTA Internationals in Auckland and Acapulco, and a WTA Premier in Charleston – Stephens was forced to stop her 2016 season in August, due to a left leg injury. Therefore, her condition is going to be quite a mystery, and probably even winning a match would be a success for the talented American. Last year, she was ousted by Svetlana Kuznetsova in the third round, though she reached the quarterfinals at the age of 20, in 2013, when Marion Bartoli beat her on her route to her crazy title.
Actually, the Tennis Gods haven’t been that kind to her. Indeed, she is going to open against compatriot Alison Riske, a good grass court player who last year reached the final in Nottingham. And even if she manages to ease past her compatriot, her potential Round 2 is going to be against Kiki Mladenovic, and her potential Round 3 against Australian Open semifinalist CoCo Vandeweghe. The impression, hence, is that we should wait a bit more to see the American at late stages in big tournaments. Though, underestimating her willingness and her talent would be a mistake…
These three “SR” players are definitely to be considered dark horses at Wimbledon. I’ve always loved this tournament, also because of its unpredictability. I would love to see one of these three women do better and reach late stages. For various reasons, I do think they deserve it!
Good luck, for now, hoping to be writing about their achievements soon!
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