LONDON – Karolina Pliskova’s run to the Wimbledon final has lifted the Czech 15 spots to number five on the leaderboard for the season-ending WTA Finals, the WTA Tour said.
The 29-year-old former world No.1, who was 20th in the ‘Race to Shenzhen’ before the grasscourt Grand Slam, collected 1,300 points and was the biggest mover of the week.
Australian world number one Ash Barty, who beat Pliskova on the All England Club’s Centre Court on Saturday to claim her second Grand Slam, cemented her spot at the top of the ladder with a lead of 1,853 points over Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus, Reuters reported.
The season-ending WTA Finals, contested by the world’s top eight singles players and eight doubles teams, was cancelled last year due to the Covid-19 pandemic and its fate for 2021 is still unclear.
The Asian swing of tournaments has been wiped from the WTA calendar for a second successive year due to the pandemic, with the governing body saying discussions about the Finals were ongoing.
The annual showpiece had a prize purse of $14 million in 2019 when it was played in Shenzhen for the first time after ending a five-year run in Singapore.
Roland Garros winner Barbora Krejcikova lost a place and was at third spot ahead of last year’s French Open champion Iga Swiatek, while Tunisia’s Ons Jabeur, the first Arab woman to reach the quarter-finals of Wimbledon, is hot on the heels of eighth-placed Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova.
American teen Coco Gauff is 10th.
Djokovic unsure about going to Games
Serbia’s Novak Djokovic said that he was “50-50” about competing at the Tokyo Olympic Games later this month following the organisers’ decision to ban fans from attending and the restrictions on the number of people he can take to the Games.
“I’ll have to think about it,” the 34-year-old told reporters in London after winning his sixth Wimbledon title. “My plan was always to go to Olympic Games.
“But right now I’m a little bit divided. It’s kind of 50-50 because of what I heard in the last couple days,” he added according to Reuters.
Wimbledon champion Novak Djokovic made it 329 weeks as world number one after collecting his third Grand Slam title of the year, when the new ATP rankings were released.
Djokovic, who has already pocketed the Australian and French Opens as well as Wimbledon, is almost 2,000 points ahead of Daniil Medvedev who remains at number two.
Matteo Berrettini, who lost Sunday’s Wimbledon final to the Serb, moves up one place to eighth while Roger Federer, who has spent 310 weeks at number one in the past, dropped a place to nine, AFP reported.
Hubert Hurcacz, who beat Federer and became the first Pole to reach the semifinals at Wimbledon, climbed seven places from 18 to 11.
Two Canadians were also on the rise with 20-year-old Felix Auger-Aliassime, a quarter-finalist at Wimbledon, going up four places to 15th while Denis Shapovalov edged into the top 10 after succumbing to Djokovic in the semifinals at the All-England Club.
Kvitova falls in Prague
Slovakian qualifier Rebecca Sramkova knocked off No. 1 seed and home favorite Petra Kvitova in first-round action at the Livesport Prague Open in the Czech Republic.
The 7-6 (5), 3-6, 6-4 victory was the first against a top-20 opponent for the 24-year-old Sramkova, who is ranked No. 226 in the world. Sramkova broke the 2018 tournament champion’s serve three straight times to finish the match in two hours and 36 minutes.
In other action, No. 7 Nina Stojanovic of Serbia rallied to beat Russia’s Vitalia Diatchenko 6-7 (5), 6-1, 6-3, and No. 9 Greet Minnen of Belgium held off Italy’s Giulia Gatto-Monticone 6-0, 4-6, 6-1.
Other winners in the Round of 32 included Americans Grace Min and Asia Muhammad and Czech Tereza Smitkova.
Hungarian Grand Prix
Top seed Yulia Putintseva of Kazakhstan opened play in Budapest with a 6-2, 6-4 win against Ekaterine Gorgodze of Georgia.
Three seeded players were eliminated. No. 4 Irina-Camelia Begu of Romania fell 6-3, 6-4 to Slovakia’s Anna Karolina Schmiedlova, No. 7 Viktoriya Tomova of Bulgaria lost 6-2, 6-3 to Argentina’s Paula Ormaechea, and No. 8 Sara Errani of Italy lost 4-6, 7-5, 6-2 to Irina Maria Bara of Romania.
Also moving on to the Round of 16 were Croatia’s Ana Konjuh and Ukraine’s Kateryna Kozlova.
Ladies Open Lausanne
No. 1 seed Tamara Zidansek of Slovenia began play in Switzerland by rallying for a 2-6, 6-3, 6-2 victory over Marina Melnikova of Russia. Zidansek saved 11 of 15 break points to avoid the early upset.
Three other matches were completed. Kazakhstan’s Zarina Dyas defeated Switzerland’s Simona Waltert 6-4, 6-4, Russia’s Natalia Vikhlyantseva outlasted Ukraine’s Katarina Zavatska 4-6, 6-4, 6-0, and France’s Clara Burel cruised 6-0, 6-2 past Swiss Susan Bandecchi.
Two matches were suspended, with American Alycia Parks leading 5-0 over Germany’s Anna-Lena Friedsam and Fiona Ferro ahead 7-5, 2-1 against French compatriot Harmony Tan.
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