Articles by Steve Tignor

Australian Open Women's Preview—Will youth continue to dominate?

Thu, 16 Jan 2020 20:53:00 +0000

Over the last year, youth has been served—and has done most of the serving—on the WTA side. Naomi Osaka, Ash Barty, and Bianca Andreescu are all 23 or under, and all won major titles last year. But only two of them will be in Melbourne; does Andreescu’s absence give the veterans—most notably, Serena Williams—a chance to stage a counterattack? Here’s a look at the Australian Open women’s draw.

In a world where parity is the rule, how do you pick a winner?

First Quarter

Barty has a lot of things going for her. She’s the top seed, she has a road to the semis that doesn’t look overly bumpy, and she’s coming off a win at her most recent big event, the WTA Finals in Shenzhen last October. She’s also playing at home: Whether or not that’s also a positive remains to be seen. The last Australian woman to win Down Under was Chris O’Neil in 1978. And having home-court advantage didn’t help Barty in the Fed Cup finals last year; she went 1-2 and Australia lost to France.

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Who might step up if Barty falters? Petra Kvitova and Madison Keys are the next-highest seeds in this section, and both have powered their way to the semifinals and beyond at Melbourne Park in the past.

Dark horse: Alison Riske. She’s coming off a career year, and she has a decent draw.

First-round matches to watch: Barty vs. Lesia Tsurenko; Keys vs. Daria Kasatkina; Kvitova vs. Katerina Siniakova

Semifinalist: Kvitova

Second Quarter

From an American standpoint, this is where things begin to heat up. The top two seeds in this section are Naomi Osaka and Serena Williams, and the most newsworthy first-round match-up pits, for the second time in the last three Slams, Venus Williams vs. Coco Gauff.

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Osaka is the defending champion, and she finished 2019 on a high note, with a couple of important titles. But she could face some land mines: Saisai Zheng in the second round; Venus or Gauff in the third round; and Barbora Strycova, possibly, in the fourth round. The other side of this section may be even stronger: Sloane Stephens, Shuai Zhang, Sofia Kenin, Johanna Konta, Caroline Wozniacki, Dayana Yastremska, and, of course, Serena, are all there.

First-round matches to watch: Osaka vs. Marie Bouzkova; V. Williams vs. Gauff; Stephens vs. Zhang; S. Williams vs. Anastasia Potapova

Semifinalist: Osaka

Third Quarter

A section with Simona Halep and Belinda Bencic as its two top seeds would seem to be a good place for a rank-and-file player to land. As talented as the Swiss and the Romanian are, they can both have their bad days—as evidenced this week by Bencic’s loss to Danielle Collins and Halep’s to Aryna Sabalenka. Halep also has to contend with a potentially difficult first-round match against Jen Brady, who opened her 2020 with wins over Barty and Maria Sharapova.

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Who might the benefit from being in a Bencic-Halep quarter? Sabalenka and Collins, to name two. The Belorussian starts against Carla Suarez Navarro, and the American, who reached the semis here last year, against 87th-ranked Vitalia Diatchenko.

Player of Interest: Su-Wei Hsieh. She has sliced and diced her way to the third and fourth rounds the last two years in Melbourne.

First-round matches to watch: Halep vs. Brady; Donna Vekic vs. Maria Sharapova; Karolina Muchova vs. Kirsten Flipkens; Su-Wei Hsieh vs. Yulia Putintseva

Semifinalist: Collins

Fourth Quarter

Karolina Pliskova and Elina Svitolina are very good in Grand Slam tune-up events, a fact borne out again by Pliskova’s impressive title run last week in Brisbane, where she edged Osaka and Keys in the final two rounds. Now, can either Pliskova or Svitolina finally go one better and win an actual Grand Slam?

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This draw gives them a chance—Serena, Osaka, Barty, and Kvitova are all in the other half, and Andreescu isn’t in the tournament at all. Who’s more likely to take advantage of this opening, the Czech or the Ukrainian? Svitolina lost badly to Collins in her only match of 2020 so far, but her road to the quarters looks plausible. She starts against Katie Boulter; the first seed she could face is Anastasia Sevastova; and her fourth-round opponent might be Kiki Bertens. Pliskova, by contrast, has started the year quickly, but may face some early obstacles in Melbourne—Kiki Mladenovic in the first round, Coco Vandeweghe in the second round, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the third round, and, possibly, Angelique Kerber in the fourth.

Also here: Amanda Anisimova, Garbiñe Muguruza

First-round matches to watch: Pliskova vs. Mladenovic; Svetlana Kuznetsova vs. Marketa Vondrousova

Semifinalist: Pliskova

Semifinals: Osaka d. Kvitova; Pliskova d. Collins

Final: Osaka d. Pliskova

Champion: Osaka

Australian Open Men's Preview—Can someone crash the usual Big 3 party?

Thu, 16 Jan 2020 15:00:00 +0000

“Can anyone crash the Big 3 party?” This has been the theme of most Grand Slam events over the last 10 years, and it is again as a new decade begins at the 2020 Australian Open. Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, and Roger Federer have won the last 12 major events, dating back to 2016; they occupy the top three positions in the rankings; and they’re healthy. Any preview of this event has to begin with them.

Here’s a look ahead at who, if anyone, might end their latest run of major-tournament dominance.

First Quarter

Nadal is the top seed, and last year’s runner-up. In 2019, he said he felt like he might not have played quite enough coming into the Australian Open; this year, after his full workload over the 10 days of the ATP Cup, that shouldn’t be a problem.

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As for his draw, it could have been worse, and it could have been better. He starts against 72nd-ranked Hugo Dellien of Bolivia, and the first seed he could face is Pablo Carreño Busta. So far, so good. Then things could get a little more tense: Nick Kyrgios or Karen Khachanov may await in the fourth round, and No. 5 seed Dominic Thiem in the quarterfinals.

Also here: Gael Monfils, Felix Auger-Aliassime, Taylor Fritz

Question mark: Khachanov. Is he ready to pick up where he left off in 2018? Or will his bumpy 2019 become the norm for him? A third-round showdown with Kyrgios could await.

Semifinalist: Nadal

Second Quarter

If there’s a Big 3 party-crasher in the house, Daniil Medvedev will be the most likely suspect. He’s the No. 4 seed; he reached the final of the last major, the US Open; and he showed flashes of his 2019 brilliance in his close loss to Djokovic at the ATP Cup.

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Has Medvedev’s high seeding come with perks? Yes and no. He’ll start against Frances Tiafoe, who had his best-ever Slam result in Melbourne last year, when he reached the quarterfinals. And Stan Wawrinka, John Isner, and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga are all in Medvedev’s half of this section. On the plus side for the Russian, he’s scheduled to face Alexander Zverev in the quarterfinals. Provided the German makes it there—he’s 0-3 so far in 2020.

Also here: David Goffin, who is coming off a win over Nadal in ATP Cup.

Dark horse: Andrey Rublev. He started the year with a title in Doha, and he’s on Zverev’s side of this quarter.

First-round matches to watch: Medvedev vs. Tiafoe; Tsonga vs. Australia’s Alexei Popyrin

Semifinalist: Rublev

Third Quarter

Usually by this point in January, we’ve watched Federer hit and giggle his way through a week at the Hopman Cup. This year, after skipping the Hopman Cup’s replacement, the ATP Cup, he’ll come in cold. Will it make any difference? The six-time Australian Open champ will start against Steve Johnson, but things could get tricky quickly if he goes up against 22-year-old, 34th-ranked up-and-comer Hubert Hurkacz in the third round. After that, it looks like smooth sailing again, at least on paper. Federer's prospective quarterfinal opponent is Matteo Berrettini, who had to miss the ATP Cup with an abdominal injury.

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Also here: 18-year-old Jannik Sinner, who starts against a qualifier.

Dark horse: Denis Shapovalov. He opens with Marton Fucsovics, a solid opponent; otherwise, the Canadian’s draw seems to give him a path to a fourth-rounder against Federer.

First-round matches to watch: Borna Coric vs. Sam Querrey; Fabio Fognini vs. Reilly Opelka

Semifinalist: Federer

Fourth Quarter

Djokovic doesn’t have Melbourne locked up in quite the way that Nadal does Paris, but with a 68-8 record there, he’s doing OK. Right now, all signs point to an eighth Aussie title, and a 17th major championship. Djokovic seems to be determined to put his disappointing second half of 2019 behind him, and he knows that, in the GOAT race, this is where he’s supposed to hold serve.

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That said, his draw could have been easier. Djokovic will start against a hard-hitting veteran opponent in Jan-Lennard Struff (the Serb has handled the German without much trouble in both of their prior meetings). More interesting would be a quarterfinal showdown with Stefanos Tsitsipas. The Greek beat Djokovic in Shanghai last year, and is coming off a career-best win at the ATP Finals last November.

Dark horse: Roberto Bautista Agut. The ninth seed is in the midst of a late-career surge. He’ll start against countryman Feliciano Lopez, and could get Tsitsipas in the fourth round.

First-round middleweight bout to watch: Dan Evans vs. Mackenzie McDonald

Semifinalist: Djokovic

Semifinals: Nadal d. Rublev; Djokovic d. Federer

Final: Djokovic d. Nadal

Champion: Djokovic

The Amazing Race: Federer, Nadal & Djokovic continue GOAT status push

Tue, 14 Jan 2020 17:00:00 +0000

As Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic make final preparations for the Australian Open, their three-way race to be crowned the Greatest of All Time has never been closer. Where does each man’s résumé stand, and what are their prospects for 2020?

Roger Federer | Rafael Nadal | Novak Djokovic

Is it an epic? A saga? An adventure? All of those words fit the three-man race that Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic have been running since the mid-2000s. Their prolonged contest to see who can win the most Grand Slam singles titles and be crowned the mythical GOAT of men’s tennis has only grown tighter over time. And there’s still no finish line in sight.

Their starts were staggered. Federer began in 2003, with his first major title, at Wimbledon. Like a born front-runner, he sprinted out to what appeared to be an insurmountable lead. Nadal came off the block two years later, with his first title at Roland Garros, and slowly pulled to within striking distance of Federer. Just when it looked as if the two would leave the ATP pack in the dust, Djokovic came tearing up behind them on the outside. He won his first major at the Australian Open in 2008; by 2011, the rivalry was a trivalry, and the Big Three was born.

In the decade since, each man has stumbled and been counted out of the race at least once. But rather than succumb to the aging process in their 30s, the way tennis champions of the past have, all three found second winds. Between them, they’ve won the last 12 Slams to bring their collective total to 55—20 for Federer; 19 for Nadal; 16 for Djokovic. No ATP player under 30 has won even one. It’s safe to say they’ve lapped the competition.

“It’s a special moment in tennis,” says former No. 1 Mark Knowles. “I remember when Pete Sampras won his 14th major and broke Roy Emerson’s record. Now you have three guys who are blowing that out of the water. That’s a testament to their professionalism, which has been unmatched by any other generation.”

The Big Three show no signs of slacking off. By now, every Slam final they play comes with added weight.

“They know what these finals mean,” says former No. 1 Jim Courier. “They know that every one they get, they’re taking one away from the other guys.”

“It’s probably not a coincidence,” adds Knowles, “that they’re becoming even more dominant as their competition gets closer.”

As 2020 begins, the Big Three are in a virtual dead heat. Each has finished five seasons at No. 1, and if you add up Grand Slams, Masters 1000s and ATP Finals titles, Djokovic has 55, and Federer and Nadal have 54 each. While Federer still leads in match wins, tournament wins and weeks at No. 1, Nadal and Djokovic are closing the gap.

“When we talk about who the greatest is, Grand Slams will be the easiest number to point to,” Courier says. “But that’s not the only metric. I think you have to look at everything.”

Can the Big Three sweep the Slams for yet another year? Can any of them gain significant ground on the others? Whoever finishes first in this race will likely be considered the Greatest of All Time for decades to come.

The Amazing Race toward GOAT status: Rafael Nadal's résumé

Tue, 14 Jan 2020 15:00:01 +0000

As Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic approach the first major of 2020s, their three-way race to be crowned the Greatest of All Time has never been closer. Below we review Nadal's résumé. Check out Federer's and Djokovic's to see how the trio stacks up against each other.

Quick hits (as of January 13, 2020)

Age / 33 (will turn 34 in on June 3)

Years on tour / 19

Grand Slam titles / 19

ATP Finals titles / 0

ATP Masters 1000 titles / 35

ATP tournament titles / 84

Weeks at No. 1 / 207

Year-end No. 1 rankings / 5

Career record / 981-199 (83.1%)

Outlook / "I would love to be the one who wins more. But I’m not playing tennis for it. I am playing tennis because I love to play tennis."

Résumé strengths

> Nadal is the best men’s clay-courter of all time. He has won the most titles at Roland Garros (12), the most titles on clay (59) and has the highest winning percentage on the surface (91.8%).

> His 83.2 winning percentage on all surfaces is the highest of any men’s player in the Open era. Nadal also has the highest winning percentage in Grand Slam finals (70%) of the Big Three.

> Nadal has spent more weeks in the Top 2 (531) than anyone. He has won at least one Slam in 13 different years, a men’s record. He’s the oldest year-end No. 1, and he’s the only one of the Big Three to have won an Olympic singles gold.

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Résumé weaknesses

> While he leads Federer in their head-to-head, 24–16, Nadal trails Djokovic, 29–26. Nadal’s Grand Slam title count relies heavily on his success at a single major (Roland Garros), and he has never won the ATP’s year-end championships, an event where Federer and Djokovic have 11 titles between them.

What advantages or disadvantages does Federer have in the race?

> He’ll always have Paris. No one enjoys a home-court advantage the way Rafa does at Roland Garros, where he’s 93–2 and has won the event 12 times in 15 tries. It’s not inconceivable that he could win five more French Opens. The disadvantages come at the Australian Open and Wimbledon; he hasn’t won either in a decade. The question for the future may be: Will Paris alone be enough for Nadal to pass Federer and hold off Djokovic?

2020 Preview

> “I’ve got him penciled in at 20 Slams,” says Knowles, who thinks another Roland Garros title for Rafa this year is virtually a foregone conclusion.

Nadal will be the favorite in Paris again, but Djokovic, who beat him there in 2015, and Dominic Thiem, who has lost to him in the last two finals, could pull an upset. If Nadal comes to Roland Garros with a chance to tie Federer at 20 Slams, the pressure will be immense.

Can Nadal find a way to steal another Slam elsewhere? He should have won a second Australian Open by now; since his lone title in 2009, Rafa has lost four finals. Nadal should contend in Oz again, but he may need someone else to do the dirty work of knocking off Djokovic.

2020 Prediction

> Nadal wins Grand Slam No. 20 at Roland Garros and wins his first ATP Finals title.

The Amazing Race toward GOAT status: Roger Federer's résumé

Tue, 14 Jan 2020 15:00:00 +0000

As Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic approach the first major of 2020s, their three-way race to be crowned the Greatest of All Time has never been closer. Below, we review Federer's résumé. Check out Nadal's and Djokovic's to see how the trio stacks up against each other.

Quick hits (as of January 13, 2020)

Age / 38 (will turn 39 on August 8)

Years on tour / 22

Grand Slam titles / 20

ATP Finals titles / 6

ATP Masters 1000 titles / 28

ATP tournament titles / 103

Weeks at No. 1 / 310

Year-end No. 1 rankings / 5

Career record / 1237–270 (82.1%)

Outlook / "I’m just trying to keep winning, and playing for Grand Slam wins. We’ll see how the race will go at the end."

Résumé strengths

> Federer is the men’s leader in Grand Slam titles and weeks at No. 1.

> From 2004 to 2007, when he won 11 of 16 Slams and went 315–24, he set a new standard for ATP dominance.

> In 2018, Federer set a new standard for longevity when, at 36, he became the oldest male player to hold the world No. 1 ranking.

> He will likely pass Jimmy Connors for most match wins (Connors has 1274 to Federer’s 1237), and may also catch him for most tournament titles (Connors has 109 to Federer’s 103).

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Résumé weaknesses

> His head-to-head records against Nadal (16–24) and Djokovic (23–26). This is partly due to Nadal’s dominance on clay (Federer is 2–14 against Rafa on the surface), and the fact that Federer has played into his late-30s against these two younger opponents. Still, the fact remains that he will likely finish on the short end of both of his biggest rivalries.

What advantages or disadvantages does Federer have in the race?

> Unfortunately for Federer, he could be a victim of his own longevity. Because of the example he’s set, Nadal and Djokovic must feel that they can stay at the top of the sport for years to come. Federer’s advantage is that he is in the lead and has set the bar high—in major titles, weeks at No. 1, matches and tournaments won. Yet while he shows few signs of slowing down, Djokovic and Nadal are catching
up anyway.

2020 Preview

> We’ve been getting reports of Federer’s decline for a decade now, and they’ve always turned out to be greatly exaggerated. Yes, he failed to a win a major in 2019, but he was one point from Wimbledon, he won a Masters title in Miami, and he closed the year with a convincing win over Djokovic in London. His No. 3 ranking shows that, so far, no one other than Nadal and Djokovic has caught up to him.

What does this mean for the soon-to-be 39-year-old? He’s confident enough in his fitness that he’s planning to play a full schedule, including the Olympic Games and Roland Garros, where he reached the semifinals in 2019 after four years away.

“With a good draw, I think Federer is still right there,” Knowles says.

2020 Prediction

> Federer wins his 21st major at Wimbledon, and announces he’ll play into his 40s.

The Amazing Race toward GOAT status: Novak Djokovic's résumé

Tue, 14 Jan 2020 15:00:00 +0000

As Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic approach the first major of 2020s, their three-way race to be crowned the Greatest of All Time has never been closer. Below, we review Djokovic's résumé. Check out Federer's and Nadal's to see how the trio stacks up against each other.

Quick hits (as of January 13, 2020)

Age / 32 (will turn 33 on May 22)

Years on tour / 17

Grand Slam titles / 16

ATP Finals titles / 5

ATP Masters 1000 titles / 34

ATP tournament titles / 77

Weeks at No. 1 / 275

Year-end No. 1 rankings / 5

Career record / 899-187 (82.8%)

Outlook / "I’m aware that making history of the sport that I truly love is something special. Of course it motivates me. It’s still far."

Résumé strengths

> Djokovic has winning records against Nadal (29–26) and Federer (26–23).

> In 2016, he became the first male player since Rod Laver to win four consecutive Grand Slam titles.

> In 2018, he became the only player to win at least one title at each of the four majors, and at each of the ATP’s nine Masters 1000 tournaments.

> His 2011 season, in which he went 70–6 (including a 41–0 start), and his 2015 season, in which he went 82–6, are two of the most dominant campaigns of the Open era.

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Résumé weaknesses

> If Djokovic has a weakness, it’s that he hasn’t caught up to his rivals yet. He’s third in the Slam race, the titles race and the match-wins race, and second in the weeks at No. 1 and Masters 1000 races. If the competition ended today, he would probably go down as the third-best of the Big Three. But the competition isn’t going to end today, or anytime soon.

What advantages or disadvantages does Federer have in the race?

> “Rafa has Roland Garros,” Courier says, “But Novak has the best avenue to get the most Grand Slam titles. He’s been training for longevity, he can win pretty comfortably on all surfaces, and he’ll probably play the most Slams of the three in the future.”

2020 Preview

> “I’m not happy with the way I finished the season,” Djokovic said at the end of 2019. It was indeed a disappointing denouement, one that could hurt him in the long run. He was forced to retire at the US Open, and he had his quest to finish No. 1 cut short by Federer in London.

Djokovic’s words should sound ominous to his tour-mates. Perhaps more so than Nadal and Federer, he has long had his eyes on the ultimate prize, and he knows he has a lot of work left to do. First on his list will be to defend his Australian Open title. Last year in Melbourne, Djokovic dropped just one set.

While Djokovic will be the man to beat at most events, younger players have gained on him. Thiem and Daniil Medvedev beat him twice last year, and Stefanos Tsitsipas did it once. By the US Open, one of them may be ready to break the Big Three stranglehold at the Slams.

2020 Prediction

> Djokovic wins his eighth Australian Open and finishes the season at No. 1.

Week in Preview: Can anyone build 11th-hour momentum before Melbourne?

Sun, 12 Jan 2020 22:52:00 +0000

After a frenetic first week, the action quiets over the next seven days, as most of the game’s big names turn their attention to the Australian Open. But others have chosen to keep competing right up until the opening bell in Melbourne. Here’s a look at this week’s four tournaments, and who might be able to build some 11th-hour momentum at them.

Adelaide International (WTA)

Adelaide, Australia

$848,000; Premier

Hard court

Draw is here

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It’s time for a restart for Ashleigh Barty. Last week, the WTA’s No. 1 player was ambushed in her opener in Brisbane by Jennifer Brady. Can the Aussie native right the ship before she heads for her home Slam? A win in Adelaide would be well-earned. Barty will be the top seed in a draw that features Simona Halep, who will make her 2020 debut, Belinda Bencic, Kiki Bertens, Aryna Sabalenka, Sofia Kenin, and 2019 French Open finalist Marketa Vondrousova, who is returning from wrist surgery and will play her first tournament since Wimbledon.

First-round matches to watch:

Anett Kontaveit vs. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova

Bencic vs. Daria Kasatkina

Sabalenka vs. Su-Wei Hsieh

Wang Qiang vs. Angelique Kerber

Adelaide International (ATP)

Adelaide, Australia

$610,000; 250 ranking points

Hard court

Draw is here

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With the Big 3 away, the Next Gen comes out to play—and scoop up as many dollars and ranking points as possible while they have the chance. The top three seeds in Adelaide are all up-and-comers: Alex De Minaur*, Felix Auger-Aliassime, and Andrey Rublev. Of those three, De Minaur and Rublev will look to build on their fast starts last week: Rublev won the title in Doha, while De Minaur acquitted himself well in the ATP Cup for Australia. Auger-Aliassime, meanwhile, will try to put his opening week behind him. The Canadian lost three of his four ATP Cup matches, all in straight sets, all to lower-ranked opponents.

*De Minaur later withdrew due to a re-aggravation of an ab injury.

ASB Classic (ATP)

Auckland, New Zealand

$610,000; 250 ranking points

Hard court

Draw is here

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As Serena Williams and the rest of the women make their exits from Auckland, the men arrive for the ATP’s version of the ASB Classic. Foremost among them are the top four seeds: Fabio Fognini, Denis Shapovalov, Karen Khachanov, and John Isner.

Also here: 22-year-old Hubert Hurkacz of Poland, who beat Dominic Thiem in ATP Cup last week, and looks like he could be set for a breakthrough year in 2020.

Hobart International (WTA)

Hobart, Australia

$275,000; International

Hard court

Draw is here

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Rounding out the last week before the Aussie open is this International-level event. Elise Mertens is the top seed, and Garbiñe Muguruza, a wild card, is No. 2.

On the mend: CiCi Bellis. After enduring four surgeries in 2019, on her wrist, arm, and elbow, the American—who is still only 20—is back on tour, and playing her second tournament. She’ll start against Marie Bouzkova.

WTA Weekend Winner: Serena takes "a step toward the next goal”

Sun, 12 Jan 2020 20:30:00 +0000

“I just have to figure out a way to win a final,” Serena Williams said at Wimbledon last summer, after losing the championship match to Simona Halep. “Maybe playing other finals outside Grand Slams would be really helpful, just to kind of get in the groove, so by the time I get to a Grand Slam final I’m kind of used to what to do and how to play.”

Six months after she uttered those words, Serena has found her final-round groove at last. On Sunday, at the ASB Classic in Auckland, she beat fellow American Jessica Pegula 6-3, 6-4 to win her first title since her victory at the 2017 Australian Open. In the three years since, she had lost five finals, including four at Grand Slam events, all in straight sets.

“It’s pretty satisfying to get a win in the final,” Williams said, while announcing that she would donate her $43,000 champion’s check to help fight the wild fires in Australia. “That was really important for me, and I just want to build on it.”

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Now the question is: Does winning an Australian Open tune-up event increase her chances of winning the Australian Open itself?

All you can say right now is: It can’t hurt. Serena lost just one set in Auckland, and she demolished the highest-ranked player she faced, Amanda Anisimova, 6-1, 6-1. She beat another solid opponent in Camila Giorgi, came back from a set down against Christina McHale, and bounced back from an early 0-2 deficit to beat Pegula. While Serena made her share of errors, and struggled coming out of the gates in a couple matches, she also showed that she’s going to do whatever it takes to compete her way to victory in Australia this month.

“You have to be your biggest cheerleader, especially if you’re feeling you’re not doing everything right,” Serena said. “Or even if you are doing everything right, but things aren’t working out for you.”

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What did Serena do right against Pegula, that she hadn’t done in her other finals over the last three years?

First, she didn’t let a slow start get out of control. Down 0-2 to begin the match, Serena fell behind 15-30 on her serve, and tried a drop shot that Pegula easily tracked down and put away for winner. Serena looked toward her coach, Patrick Mouratoglou, and shrugged as if to say: I don’t know what to do.

Serena may not have known what shot to hit at that moment, but she did know how to fight. From 15-40 down, she grunted, shouted, and exhorted her way back into that service game. It took everything she had to hold, but she was on the board.

That fact seemed to allow Serena to relax, play within herself, and stop trying to do too much. She broke serve by dialing back the pace, hitting with more margin, and watching as Pegula’s forehands went awry. Suddenly, Serena’s game began to flow: Her backhands were well-measured, her return was sharper, and her serve was, well, her serve. She was breathing hard, but she was making shots.

“My ground strokes were probably the strongest thing in that match,” Serena said, while noting that she didn’t “hit a tremendous amount of aces.” “It’s good for me to win matches where I’m not getting too many free points.”

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Serena surmounted Pegula, who is ranked No. 64, by playing within herself and not relying too heavily on her serve. Is that a recipe for success against higher-quality opponents? It could be: We’ve seen Serena step back and win big finals with consistency, rather than blistering pace, before. And with Bianca Andreescu pulling out of the Australian Open, Serena won’t have to find a way to beat the woman who knocked her out in last year’s US Open final.

“It’s just a step toward the next goal,” Serena said of her win in Auckland.

Before today, Serena won 72 finals in her two decades on tour. Getting another in Melbourne will be harder, but at 38, after three years spent outside the winner’s circle, it must feel good to know there are more titles—Grand Slam or otherwise—in her future.

ATP Weekend Winner: Djokovic soaks up sounds of “Nole!” and “Serbia!”

Sun, 12 Jan 2020 18:40:00 +0000

After his 6-2, 7-6 (4) win over Rafael Nadal in the final of the ATP Cup, Novak Djokovic was asked if he had ever played a match against his long-time rival in front of a crowd like the one that jammed itself into Sydney’s Ken Rosewall Arena on Sunday.

“No,” Djokovic said with a wide grin and a shake of his head.

Why was this audience so different from the ones who had gathered to watch the previous 54 meetings between the Serb and the Spaniard? Because they were firmly, and loudly, in Djokovic's corner from start to finish. When he roared and raised his fist after a winning point, they roared and raised their fists back. When he asked them to stand and give him some love, they stood and gave him some love. Rather than having to pretend that the crowd was chanting his name instead of his opponent’s—the way he did in his Wimbledon final against Roger Federer last year—Djokovic soaked up the sounds of “No-le!” and “Ser-bia!” that reverberated through the building. If you’ve ever wondered what tennis in the Big 3 era would have looked and sounded like if Djokovic had been the world’s most popular player, this match gave you a pretty good idea.

“It was really unbelievable,” Djokovic said of the thousands of flag-waving Serbs in Australia who came out to root on his nation’s team throughout the ATP Cup. “The amount of support we got in Brisbane in the group stage and now here in Sydney, you guys took it to a new level.”

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The Serbian team responded by winning the inaugural edition of ATP’s new, season-opening event. Djokovic went 6-0 in singles during the tournament, and 2-0 in doubles, and he and Viktor Troicki clinched the title with a 6-3, 6-4 win over Pablo Carreño Busta and Feliciano Lopez in Sunday’s doubles match.

“I’ll remember this experience for the rest of my life as definitely one of the nicest moments of my career,” Djokovic said.

Of all of the memorable experiences that Djokovic had over the last 10 days, the most significant was his win over Nadal. This was the collision that the tennis world had been waiting to see: No. 1 vs. No. 2, in a rematch of last year’s Australian Open final, with the ATP Cup on the line. Djokovic came in ranked No. 2, but he had won seven straight straight matches over the world No. 1 on hard courts, dating all the way back to 2013. His 19-7 record against Nadal on hard was even better than the 17-7 record that Nadal has amassed against him on clay.

It took all of 10 minutes for Djokovic to reassert his superiority over Rafa on the surface, and reestablish all of the old patterns that have worked so well for him in their previous matches. Djokovic broke Nadal in the opening game by doing just what he did in last year’s Australian Open final: Pounding his backhand into Nadal’s forehand, opening up Rafa’s backhand side and forcing him to go to his weaker slice, and closing out the rally from there. By the time Djokovic had held for 2-0 with a confident, 110-m.p.h. second serve, Nadal looked lost. While the Spanish team chattered Rafa’s ear off, the Serbian side was the picture of calm. For good reason.

“I started the match perfectly,” Djokovic said. And he continued in that vein for the first eight games. By the end of the first set, Djokovic had left his normal baseline patterns behind and was swinging with total freedom.

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A year ago in the Australian Open final, Nadal never came up with an answer for Djokovic’s opening barrage. The Serb was in control throughout his 6-3, 6-2, 6-3 win, which lasted just over two hours—for these guys, that qualifies as a 100-meter dash to the finish line. Could Rafa find a way to mount a counterattack this time? Commentating on the sidelines, Tim Henman advised Nadal to ditch his “totally ineffective” chip backhand, move closer to the baseline, and “just go for it.” Unlike so many of Rafa’s opponents, Henman said, “Djokovic isn’t going to beat himself.” He had a point.

Nadal must have thinking along the same lines. In the opening game of the second set, Rafa won two points by serving and volleying, and over the next few games he was able to use his serve to slow Djokovic’s momentum. While Nadal will never beat Djokovic by rushing the net, winning points up there seemed to give him the confidence he needed to be aggressive from the baseline. In the second set, he began to slug his backhand instead of chipping it, and nearly turned this match around. At 2-3, Rafa reached break point five times, only to have Djokovic wipe each one away with a winner—one with a forehand, one with a backhand, and three with his serve.

From there, the level of play rose as Djokovic and Nadal see-sawed toward a tiebreaker. Rafa saved two break points at 5-5, one with a backhand winner and another with a volley winner, but ultimately it was Djokovic who came up with the shot of the match when needed it. At 4-4 in the tiebreaker, with a third set in the balance, Djokovic went back to his old baseline pattern, and found an opening for a backhand winner to make it 5-4, with two of his own serves to come. He had finished the way he started.

“I was trying to take as much time as possible away from him,” Djokovic said. “I was serving very well, definitely the best serving match I had in the tournament. Just extremely satisfied in the way I performed.”

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But Nadal was able to take some satisfaction of his own from this match. Unlike last year’s Aussie Open final, he found a way to make inroads into Djokovic’s game this time.

“I did the most difficult thing: changed a little the dynamic of the match after that first set,” Nadal said. “Happy the way I was able to compete.”

“I had my chances. I was very close. Not happy with the loss, of course, but the feeling in that second set is positive.”

Move up in the court, drive the backhand, get to the net, hit the forehand down the line, use the serve for all its worth: That’s a difficult blueprint for Nadal to execute if he wants to beat Djokovic, but at least he has a blueprint now.

Djokovic, though, walks away from Sydney with something more important: A win over the world No. 1 to start the season, a victory in the ATP Cup, and the memory of the roar of the crowd in his ears. He may still be hearing that roar when he gets to Melbourne.

In Laver Cup, and now ATP Cup, the super-tiebreaker is having its day

Fri, 10 Jan 2020 18:52:00 +0000

If the ATP Cup has had a signature moment so far, it was the sight of Australia’s Nick Kyrgios picking up his doubles partner Alex De Minaur and throwing him over his shoulder after their tie-clinching quarterfinal win against Great Britain earlier this week. It was a celebration worthy of their victory. The Aussies had been down multiple match points—and had watched Jamie Murray miss the easiest of put-aways on one of them—before ultimately winning 18-16 in the deciding super-tiebreaker.

Or should we call it a “match tiebreak”? Or a “10-point tiebreaker”? Tennis has never quite made up its mind about how to refer to this elongated version of the old-fashioned tiebreaker, which is first-to-10-points instead of first-to-seven. That lack of specificity may reflect the sport’s ambiguous feelings about this scoring innovation. The super-tiebreaker has been around for years, and is even used in place of a third set in ATP doubles matches. Yet it has also been widely scorned by recreational players and traditionalist fans. There was an outcry when it was announced that men’s doubles was going to the 10-pointer a decade ago. The move was widely, and correctly, seen as a way to get doubles matches out of the way faster.

Are those attitudes changing before our eyes? Is the much-maligned match-tiebreak having a moment? Last year, the Australian Open became the first Grand Slam event to incorporate it in singles, at 6-6 in the final set. But if there has been a change of heart toward the super T, it’s probably Laver Cup that has been responsible for it. The Roger Federer-led team competition has extended the use of the 10-pointer to all of its matches, singles and doubles, and in the process has given fans a glimpse of the efficient drama that the format can produce. Seemingly every match of note, in all three Laver Cups, has ended in a close 10-pointer. For millions of fans, if something is good enough for Federer, it’s going to be good enough for them. Laver Cup itself is an exhibition that goes out of its way to try to make us believe that it’s also a serious competition; it can’t do that without getting us to believe that the match tiebreak is a legitimate format for real tennis.

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And it is. Over the years, I’ve heard complaints about super-tiebreakers from fellow rec players at tournaments and clubs. The primary beef is that the format is too much of a crapshoot; even if you’re the better player, all your opponent has to do is find a way win a set, and then you have to roll the dice in the super T. I’ve never thought of it that way. To me, as a player and a spectator, the 10-pointer is long enough to feel substantial; it’s much harder to win on big-serving alone, the way you often can in a seven-pointer. But the fact that every point counts also gives it a sense of momentum that you don’t get from a regular deuce-game sets. As far as ways to shorten matches go, I’ll take a deciding 10-point tiebreaker over a series off four-game sets. By using 10-pointers, Laver Cup has also avoided the wee-hour finishing times that plagued the Davis Cup Finals in Madrid last November.

Tennis is proud of the fact that “some points count more than others,” and justifiably so; it gives the best players a chance to rise to the occasion and show off their nerve and their smarts, rather than just their skill. The downside, from an efficiency-of-entertainment standpoint, is that lots of points don’t end up counting at all in the final score. The points that count the most, of course, are the ones that come in tiebreakers. A super T just means we’ll see more of them.

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Don’t get me wrong, I’m not arguing for any match-shortening scoring changes, at least at the big events. I like tennis’s medieval system. I like six-game sets; I like the tension that builds during drawn-out deuce games; I like best-of-five at the Grand Slams; I like saying 15-30-40 instead of 1-2-3; I like using mysterious, elitist terms like “love” and “deuce”; I like that you can win lose more points and still win. Part of me, though, does think that a 10-point tiebreaker might be a good substitute for a fifth set at the majors someday; in volleyball, the first four sets go to 25 and the fifth goes 15, and it makes for an exciting, turbo-charged way to finish a match. But fifth sets in tennis are exciting enough as they are; there’s no reason to shorten them. My only advice would be for Wimbledon to consider joining the Australian Open and making its new tiebreaker at 12-all in the final set into a properly grand 10-pointer. It could be re-branded as the “royal tiebreaker.”

The two best singles matches at the ATP Cup so far have been Dan Evans’ win over Alex De Minaur, and Novak Djokovic’s win over Denis Shapovalov, in the quarterfinals. Each involved a full third set, and each ended in a regular seven-point tiebreaker. I wouldn’t have wanted either of those excellent contests to be a point shorter than they were. But that match-deciding super-tiebreaker between Aussies and the Brits, when each team was facing the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat at virtually the same moment, was pretty cool—and very real—too.

Week in Preview: WTA kicks off 2020 campaign with three tournaments

Sun, 05 Jan 2020 23:00:00 +0000

Are you ready for a good old-fashioned tennis tournament? The WTA returns with three this week. Between them, most of the tour’s big stars, including Serena Williams and Coco Gauff, will be back in action.

With Davis Cup and Fed Cup closing out the 2019 season, and the new ATP Cup opening up 2020, tennis is up to its eyeballs in team play these days. Those events have their advantages, but I’ve started to miss the do-or-die tension, and the methodical march forward from one round to the next, that only single-elimination can give us.

For those of you who agree, and who are looking for a good, old-fashioned tennis tournament, relief is on the way this week, when the WTA kicks off its 2020 campaign with three tournaments, and the ATP returns to Doha. Here’s a look at who’s starting where, and how those draws might play out.

Brisbane International (WTA)

Brisbane, Australia

$1,500,000; Premier

Hard court

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The ATP Cup brought several of the top men’s stars to Brisbane last week. Now an all-star lineup of WTA luminaries will join them for this 30-player Premier event. The draw reads like a who’s who of the tour’s Top 20: Ash Barty, Karolina Pliskova, Naomi Osaka, Elina Svitolina, Petra Kvitova, Kiki Bertens, Jo Konta, Madison Keys, Sloane Stephens, Angie Kerber, and more will be there.

With the Australian Open starting in two weeks, everyone will want to get their matches in. Pliskova has won this tournament two of the last three years; in 2019, she followed her title up with a run to the semifinals in Melbourne.

First-round matches to watch:

Kvitova vs. Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova

Svitolina vs. Danielle Collins

Bertens vs. Dayana Yastremska

Osaka vs. Maria Sakkari

Alison Riske vs. Karolina Muchova

ASB Classic (WTA)

Auckland, New Zealand

$275,000

Hard court; International

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Auckland doesn’t offer the most prize money or ranking points this week, but it makes up for it in star power. Two Americans, one 38 and the other 15, headline this 32-player draw. Serena Williams is the top seed, and will face Svetlana Kuznetsova in the first round. Near them at the top of the bracket is Coco Gauff, who will begin against Viktoria Kuzmova. If Williams and Gauff each win two rounds, they’ll face each other for the first time.

Also here: Amanda Anisimova, Petra Martic, Caroline Wozniacki, and two-time defending champion Julia Goerges

Returning: CiCi Bellis

Shenzhen Open (WTA)

Shenzhen, China

$775,000; International

Hard court

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There’s more money in the Shenzhen purse than there is in Auckland—$500,000 more, to be exact—but there’s no Serena. Instead, Belinda Bencic and Aryna Sabalenka are the top 2 seeds. The Swiss will try to pick up where she left off in 2019, while the Belorussian will try to forget 2019 and pick up where she left off the year before.

Qatar Exxon Mobil Open (ATP)

Doha, Qatar

$1,465,260; 250 ranking points

Hard court

There aren’t many big, or even medium-sized, names missing from the ATP Cup, but most of them can be found in Doha. Stan Wawrinka, Andrey Rublev, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, and Milos Raonic are the Top 4 seeds.

Twenty 2020 Questions: The best WTA player you may be unfamiliar with?

Sat, 04 Jan 2020 21:02:00 +0000

We're answering the 10 biggest questions on the WTA and ATP tours in 2020. The entire list will be rolled out here.

The WTA doesn’t lack for new blood. In addition to Bianca Andreescu, 2019 introduced us to a debut Roland Garros runner-up in Marketa Vondrousova, and semifinalist in Anisimova; and a first-time Wimbledon quarterfinalist in Karolina Muchova. Who might make a similar splash in 2020?

Getty Images: Dayana Yastremska celebrates after defeating Karolina Pliskova in Wuhan.

While she hasn’t gone deep at a major, it’s probably only a matter of time for 19-year-old Dayana Yastremska. The Ukrainian has already won three titles, she attacks fearlessly and creates her own winners from the baseline, and she’s stubbornly competitive. Yastremska—the name will ring a bell among baseball fans of a certain age—doesn’t have a signature win yet, but she has steadily improved her ranking and shown that she can win finals. And unlike some other young stars, Yastremska also shouldn’t feel the pressure of expectations this season.

Twenty 2020 Questions: What if there are no more Serenas?

Fri, 03 Jan 2020 21:25:00 +0000

We're answering the 10 biggest questions on the WTA and ATP tours in 2020. The entire list will be rolled out here.

In the 11 Slams played since Serena’s last major triumph, at the 2017 Australian Open, there have been nine different winners. Yet many would argue that the tour has thrived, rejuvenating itself with new types of stars—brash Bianca, bashful Naomi—for a new decade.

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What has been best about this period, above all, is that it’s been about success rather than failure. Instead of Slam-less No. 1s, we’ve seen Simona Halep and Caroline Wozniacki make major breakthroughs. Instead of young players failing to measure up, we’ve seen Andreescu and Osaka rise to the biggest occasions. Tennis always has a future, and it should be fun to watch this one continue to take shape in 2020.

ATP Cup gives men’s tour a new, long-overdue, curtain-raising event

Thu, 02 Jan 2020 23:27:00 +0000

If you’ve been following the lead-up to the ATP Cup on social media, you might be wondering if the whole thing was just a ploy to get the players to take their shirts off for the cameras. The Spanish team, the Bulgarian team, the Austrian team: They’ve all been photographed frolicking together, half-clothed, on an Australian beach.

There are worse ways of letting people know the tennis season is about to begin again, I guess. And there are worse ways to start a new season, and a new decade, than with a new event that features teams from 24 countries competing for $15 million in Brisbane, Perth, and Sydney. For years, many of us in the media have called for tennis to create a special curtain-raising event to kick off the season. The ATP Cup, which runs from January 3 to the 12th, features Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, and virtually every other Top 20 player except Roger Federer, and comes with a healthy dose of patriotic team spirit, fits the bill nicely.

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Of course, this being tennis, you can’t make an omelette without smashing a few eggs. In this case, the smashed egg in question is the Hopman Cup, the ITF’s duel-gender exhibition in Perth that had served as a season-opener since 1989, and made headlines a year ago by putting the game’s resident GOATs, Roger Federer and Serena Williams, on a court together. After that feel-good moment went viral, the time seemed right for the sport to finally commit to developing a big dual-gender team event. Instead, it has gone the single-gender route again. In that sense, the ATP Cup feels like both a step forward, and a missed opportunity.

But with that downside come a number of upsides. Unlike the two other men’s team events, Davis Cup and Laver Cup, the ATP Cup comes with ranking points. It puts doubles on an equal plane with singles. It enlists several popular past champions—Boris Becker and Marat Safin among them—as team captains. And it guarantees the players a week’s worth of tune-up matches, along with a “participation fee.” The biggest question mark may be whether, with so many teams, locations, and rounds packed into 10 days, the whole thing can easily be followed. For that, we’ll just have to wait, and watch, and find out. Here are five things to track as the ATP Cup zooms along, and the 2020 season begins.

What will the event mean for Nadal and Djokovic as they restart their Grand Slam title race?

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With Federer absent, the star power will be provided by the world’s top two players, Nadal and Djokovic. They played in last year’s Australian Open final, split the four majors, and battled down to the wire for the year-end No. 1 ranking.

By all accounts, Nadal, who was slowed by injury at the end of 2019, is healthy and playing well, and ready for the challenge of getting Grand Slam No. 20 this year. Spain is in the eminently winnable Group B, with Uruguay, Japan, and Georgia. Nadal will start his season against Nikoloz Basilashvili of Georgia on January 4th, Pablo Cuevas of Uruguay on the 6th, and Yoshihito Nishioka of Japan on the 8th.

Djokovic, who will be defending his Australian Open crown in three weeks, may have more to gain and prove during the ATP Cup. He has voiced his disappointment in the way his 2019 ended, with a withdrawal at the US Open, a round-robin exit at the ATP Finals, and a crushingly close quarterfinal defeat in Davis Cup. I’m guessing he’ll want to put all of that behind him as quickly as possible when he faces Kevin Anderson of South Africa, Gael Monfils of France, and Cristian Garin of Chile in Brisbane.

There’s no Group of Death, but there is a Group of Youth

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There will be big names and good matches all over Australia next week, but Group F may pack the most fireworks into its six ties. It’s not a Group of Death, exactly, but, with Greece, Australia, Canada, and Germany facing off, it will be a Group of Youth—and youthful bravado. Alexander Zverev, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Nick Kyrgios, Alex De Minaur, Denis Shapovalov, and Felix Auger Aliassime will mix it up in Brisbane, and the presence of the Aussie team should guarantee good, loud crowds to see them.

Who might emerge with momentum heading into the Australian Open? This should be a perfect format for hometown heroes Kyrgios and De Minaur. But it also seems to me that Zverev is due to reassert himself in 2020. He likes Laver Cup; chances are he’ll like the ATP Cup, too.

Is Russia ready to explode, or implode?

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With Daniil Medvedev and Karen Khachanov leading the way, Russia may be the most intriguing of the 24 teams. They could win it all, or go down early, depending on how these two young and at times unpredictable stars are feeling and playing to start the season. Last year, Khachanov was the man seemingly on the rise, but he flat-lined in 2019.

This year, it’s the fifth-ranked Medvedev who will be feeling the weight of expectations after nearly running the ATP table from August to October. The ATP Cup should give us an early answer to one of the year’s major questions: Namely, is Medvedev for real? Russia will be in Group D, with the United States, Italy, and Norway. That sounds winnable.

Where does Canada go from here?

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Shapovalov, Auger Aliassime, Bianca Andreescu: Canadian tennis put itself on the world map in 2019. Andreescu won the country’s first major title, at the Australian Open, while Shapo and FAA nearly won its first Davis Cup. But within the men’s team, a surprising turnaround took place in the middle of 2019: As Auger Aliassime’s season sputtered, Shapovalov's suddenly took flight.

Will those two trajectories continue into 2020? Is Shapovalov a credible Grand Slam threat? Can Auger Aliassime switch into a higher gear and develop a go-to weapon? The Canadians are in the Group of Youth; how they perform in it could be a harbinger of the year to come for both players.

Can tennis help shine a needed light on the Australian wild fires?

As you may know, there’s a slightly more important story happening Down Under than the ATP Cup. New South Wales has been ravaged by wild fires for three months; 15 millions acres have been destroyed since September, and Sydney is permeated with thick smoke. Yet, as climate writer David Wallace-Wells points out in a New York magazine article entitled “Global Apathy Toward the Fires in Australia is a Scary Portent for the Future,” the rest of the world has yet to register the importance, and danger, of what’s happening there.

I’m kicking off the support for those affected by the fires. I’ll be donating $200 per ace that I hit across all the events I play this summer. #MoreToCome #StayTuned
— Nicholas Kyrgios (@NickKyrgios) January 2, 2020

Tennis, with its international scope, would seem to be ideally positioned to help raise awareness around the world, and bring some relief to those affected, over the next month. Can this typically apolitical sport rise to the occasion? Kyrgios has pledged $200 for every ace he hits, and he’s been joined by several other players. Let’s hope that’s just the beginning of a concerted month-long effort. Australia has supported tennis like few other countries over the last century; tennis should do what it can to support it back.

Twenty 2020 Questions: Can anything stop Bianca Andreescu?

Thu, 02 Jan 2020 13:16:00 +0000

We're answering the 10 biggest questions on the WTA and ATP tours in 2020. The entire list will be rolled out here.

As a WTA rookie still in her teens, Andreescu won the 2019 US Open, Rogers Cup and Indian Wells, and put together a 17-match win streak. But the best reason to believe in Andreescu’s future success may have been Serena’s seal of approval. “I think we’re really similar; we both are fighters and are really intense,” Serena said after their US Open final.

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When a 23-time major champion sees something of herself in you, you’re probably going places. If there was a reason for caution, it came not from Andreescu’s game, but from her body. She missed significant time due to injury in 2019, and withdrew from the WTA Finals. She has the mind and the shots; the final piece of the puzzle for 2020 and beyond may be her fitness.

Twenty 2020 Questions: What should we reasonably expect from Gauff?

Wed, 01 Jan 2020 19:53:00 +0000

We're answering the 10 biggest questions on the WTA and ATP tours in 2020. The entire list will be rolled out here.

The price of rising so high as a 15-year-old rookie is that fans will expect you to top yourself at 16. Gauff rose higher than anyone anticipated in 2019—fourth round at Wimbledon, third round at the US Open and a maiden WTA title. She brought the crowd in Centre Court to its feet and earned an audience with Michelle Obama. Is she destined to hear those dreaded words, “sophomore slump,” in 2020?

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It’s possible. Gauff still needs to sharpen her technique, especially on her forehand, and no opponent will underestimate her again. But even if they’re ready for her, she’ll still hit harder and run faster than most of them. Ironically, what might help Gauff most is the WTA’s so-called “Capriati Rule,” which will limit the number of events she can play, and thus limit people’s expectations for how far her ranking can rise.

Twenty 2020 Questions: Can Naomi Osaka find happiness on court?

Tue, 31 Dec 2019 20:47:00 +0000

We're answering the 10 biggest questions on the WTA and ATP tours in 2020. The entire list will be rolled out here.

“2019 was probably the best year of my life…I learned a lot this year and I realized I have great influence over the things that can happen to me.”

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Osaka’s upbeat assessment of her season, which she tweeted in November, was music to the ears of many. After rising to No. 1 in January, Osaka struggled—with her game, the weight of expectations, and her desire to play. She split with two coaches and lost early at three majors. But by year’s end, Osaka, with her father as her coach, turned a corner by winning two titles in Asia and reminding everyone of what a powerful, athletic force she is.

Is the worst over for the 22-year-old? As always with this appealingly unguarded athlete, it will be fascinating to find out what comes next.

Twenty 2020 Questions: Who’s the next first-time major winner?

Mon, 30 Dec 2019 21:16:00 +0000

We're answering the 10 biggest questions on the WTA and ATP tours in 2020. The entire list will be rolled out here.

Karolina Pliskova is good at winning tune-up events, but not the Slams themselves. Elina Svitolina made the semis at two majors for the first time last year, but quickly exited both times. Keys can be unbeatable for stretches, but they never last two weeks. Kiki Bertens, after making rapid progress in 2017 and 2018, seems to have hit a ceiling.

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Which leads us back to another woman recently touted as the future of the WTA: Aryna Sabalenka. With power and precision, the long-limbed Belarusian rocketed into the Top 10 two years ago, only to suffer a sophomore slump in 2019, in and out of the majors. The good news? In October, the 21-year-old righted herself with a title in Wuhan, where she beat two Top-10 foes and reminded us just how sky-high her upside remains.

Twenty 2020 Questions: Is Ash Barty ready to be a long-term No. 1?

Sun, 29 Dec 2019 20:27:00 +0000

We're answering the 10 biggest questions on the WTA and ATP tours in 2020. The entire list will be rolled out here.

The 23-year-old seems to have it all: the smooth serve, the putaway forehand, the biting slice backhand and a nose for the net. She also has a French Open title, and the No. 1 ranking. The only thing missing is the intimidation factor. Barty is just 5’5”, which means she can’t win with overwhelming power alone.

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She’s also too down-to-earth to believe she should win every match she plays, the way so many champions do. After rising to No. 1 last June, Barty went four months without a title, yet gathered herself at year’s end to beat four Top-10 opponents on her way to winning the WTA Finals. Barty’s game is too good—and so much more complete than most of her opponents’— for her not to believe in it.

Twenty 2020 Questions: Is there a rivalry waiting to happen?

Sat, 28 Dec 2019 20:09:00 +0000

We're answering the 10 biggest questions on the WTA and ATP tours in 2020. The entire list will be rolled out here.

The WTA has a lot going for it these days: depth, personality, fresh faces, the continued presence of the Williams sisters. But it doesn’t have a rivalry at the top to drive the tour, the way it did in the days of Evert vs. Navratilova, Graf vs. Seles, and Serena vs. Henin.

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Where might we find one? How about the last two US Open champions. In 2018, 20-year-old Naomi Osaka beat Serena for the title; in 2019, 19-year-old Bianca Andreescu did the same. Osaka and Andreescu have played just once, and the match, which Osaka won in three topsy-turvy sets last year in Beijing, didn’t disappoint. Hopefully we’ll see more of that this year. These two women play exciting, attacking games, and their personalities—Osaka diffident, Andreescu dramatic—offer the same fire-and-ice contrast that shaped so many great tennis rivalries of the past.