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The glass half empty view of Leylah Annie Fernandez and Bianca Andreescu is that they’ve slipped within the rankings since their greatest days. The sensation being that they’re experiencing the challenges typically confronted by gamers who skyrocket to success.
The glass half full perspective is that they’re nonetheless gifted gamers primed to rise once more in 2023.
When the 2021 US Open began, Fernandez and qualifier Emma Raducanu of Britain had been relative unknowns. By the point it completed, Fernandez had turned 19 and was the runner-up. Raducanu, nonetheless two months from her 19th birthday, ended up being the shock champion.
Within the aftermath of such a momentous fortnight, the apparent conjecture was about how the pair would fare within the months and years forward.
On that rating, Fernandez has thus far been the clear winner – her rating dropping from No. 24 on the finish of 2021 to No. 40 this yr, whereas Raducanu plummeted from No. 19 to No. 80.
Each gamers confronted bodily adversity in 2022 – Fernandez struggling a grade three stress fracture on the highest of her proper foot that stored her out of motion from early June till early August on the Nationwide Financial institution Open introduced by Rogers in Toronto.
Raducanu endured a sequence of accidents that meant she had a stop-and-go yr that completed with a 17-19 match document. Fernandez was 21-15.
It was an ominous signal for Fernandez when she misplaced 6-4, 6-2 within the first spherical of the Australian Open to unheralded Aussie wild card Maddison Inglis. However a minimum of it now provides her a golden alternative to enhance on that outcome subsequent month at Melbourne Park.
After Australia, Fernandez acquired again on observe on the Monterrey, Mexico, WTA 250 in February – defending her title with a 6-7(6), 6-4, 7-6(3) win over Colombia’s Camila Osorio within the ultimate.
From there she had disappointing ends in occasions reminiscent of Miami (Karolina Muchova) and Charleston (Magda Linette) earlier than taking part in like her outdated self once more in reaching the French Open quarter-finals with wins over No. 14-ranked Belinda Bencic and No. 28 Amanda Anisimova earlier than that foot harm occurred early in her subsequent match in opposition to No. 59 Martina Trevisan of Italy. Regardless of grimacing with ache on just a few events, the hyper-motivated Fernandez battled on however misplaced not solely the match 6-2, 6-7(3), 6-3, however finally the entire grass-court season and a few summer time hard-court tournaments till Toronto due to the harm.
Beatriz Haddad Maia beat Fernandez within the second spherical on the Nationwide Financial institution Open and for the remainder of the summer time, she confronted some powerful Russians – shedding to Ekaterina Alexandrova in Cincinnati, Liudmila Samsonova on the US Open and Daria Kasatkina in San Diego. There have been additionally two losses to Bencic – 7-5, 6-7(10), 6-3 on the WTA 1000 in Guadalajara in October – after which 6-0, 7-5 within the Billie Jean King Cup by Gainbridge Finals in Glasgow when the 25-year-old Swiss was the chief of what appeared just like the crew of future on a profitable mission to win the title after ending runner-up in 2021.
However there was a wonderful ultimate instance of Fernandez at her fiery best in Canada’s opening tie in Glasgow. She acquired revenge for that fateful French Open quarter-final loss to Trevisan, demolishing the world No. 28 in 44 minutes – profitable 6-0, 6-0.
As a lot as 2022 had setbacks, Fernandez by no means appeared to lose her fierce aggressive spirit, omen for a rebound subsequent yr.
These have been attention-grabbing occasions for Bianca Andreescu since 2019 and her exceptional US Open triumph. Knee and foot points resulted in 2000 being a complete write-off, after which in her comeback in 2021 she confronted accidents and a spring-time bout of COVID-19 in Europe that set her again mentally and bodily.
That was a part of the rationale she paused her begin to 2022, with a few of that point spent on a wellness break in Costa Rica to “reset, recuperate and develop.”
She was off the tour from October 2021, till mid-April 2022, on the indoor clay-court occasion in Stuttgart.
Throughout a document of 20-13 for the season, she typically performed tennis worthy of her pedigree – beating gamers reminiscent of Halep, Kasatkina (twice), Haddad Maia, Samsonova, Cornet, Collins and Kvitova – however too typically with out sustaining the top-level consistency wanted to get deep into attracts.
She solely had a single first-round loss all yr and reached one ultimate – in Unhealthy Homberg, Germany, shedding to Caroline Garcia on grass in June.
Within the three Grand Slam occasions she performed, she misplaced every time to a high quality opponent – on the French Open to Bencic within the second spherical, to eventual champion Elena Rybakina within the second spherical at Wimbledon and to essentially the most in-form participant, Garcia, within the third spherical on the US Open.
Her ultimate rating of No. 46 after an abbreviated 2021 season was adopted by No. 46 and one other abbreviated season in 2022.
A key to her play in 2022 was her health coach, Abdul Sillah, who helped her keep wholesome and keep away from accidents. He additionally was an enthusiastic cheerleader courtside throughout her matches. However when he determined to attempt to have an association whereby he would work with Andreescu, and likewise along with his former-client Naomi Osaka, it will definitely led to the top of their relationship
When Andreescu, 22, parted methods with coach Sven Groeneveld after the season, it created a possibility for a brand new departure in 2023, which must be intriguing to observe.
The texture-good story of 2022 Canadian girls’s tennis was Rebecca Marino’s return to the High 100 for the primary time in 10 years.
Marino, who turned 32 on December 16, compiled a 49-24 document in any respect ranges and paid her dues touring the world, taking part in in 25 occasions from Australia to start out the yr all the way in which to the WTA 125 in Tampico and Billie Jean King Cup in Glasgow to finish it in Mexico and Scotland – with stops alongside the way in which in India and South Korea.
She certified for each the Australian and French Opens however misplaced within the opening spherical of the primary three Grand Slam occasions. That modified on the US Open the place she received a main-draw spherical for the primary time since 2010 – defeating No. 103 Magdalena Frech of Poland – after which Ukrainian qualifier No. 124 Daria Segur, who had upset 7th-seeded Simona Halep within the earlier spherical. Marino misplaced 6-2, 6-4 within the third spherical to No. 36 Zhang Shuai of China.
She received a $60,000 ITF occasion in Arcadia, California, in March and reached the ultimate of one other ITF $60,000 in Irapuato, Mexico the next week.
A low level within the yr, particularly together with her grass-court pleasant sport, was a first-round loss at Wimbledon to qualifier Katarzyna Kawa. The 29-year-old Pole is especially a doubles participant who was No. 132 in singles.
By rating, Marino’s greatest win was 6-2, 6-3 over No. 40 Fernandez within the third spherical of her ultimate tour occasion of the season, the WTA 125 in Tampico. Marino had a lot of her 2022 success after establishing a training association with former Mexican participant Bruno Echagarry, and her year-end No. 64 WTA rating, up from No. 144 in 2021, was a reward for a yr of doing numerous laborious slogging.
After greater than a decade with a WTA rating – a big a part of that point spent at Stanford College the place she was NCAA singles runner-up in 2015 – Carol Zhao completed for the second time in her profession contained in the High 200 at No. 190 in a mercifully moderately injury-free yr. That’s up from No. 283 at first of 2022.
Zhao, 27, performed 26 (29-24) occasions this yr together with her highlights being a title on the $100,000 ITF match in Charleston, S.C., in June, three weeks after she received the ITF $25,000 in Incheon, Korea. She was a member of Canada’s Billie Jean King Cup crew for ties in each Vancouver and Glasgow.
Katherine Sebov raised her rating from No. 344 to No. 223 in 2022. The 23-year-old from Toronto reached the ultimate of the $60,000 ITF occasion in Saguenay, Quebec, in October – shedding 3-6, 6-4, 6-3 to No. 308 Karman Kaur Thandi of India. She ended her season qualifying and making it to the quarter-finals of the WTA 125 match in Midland, Michigan. Earlier within the yr, she reached 4 ITF match semi-finals – one in Nottingham, England in April, two in Madrid in June and one in Columbus, Ohio, in July.
Genie Bouchard, a generally forgotten determine of the Canadian girls’s tennis scene, had surgical procedure for a torn subscapularis in her proper shoulder in June 2021. She returned to motion for the primary time since March 2021, on the Odlum Brown VanOpen in August. In a complete of 15 matches (6-9) in 2022, she went from no rating to her present No. 327. Her best hour was on the WTA 500 in Ostrava, Czech Republic, in October. There, she defeated No. 100 Océane Dodin and No. 87 Dalma Galfi within the qualifying earlier than a powerful efficiency in a 6-7(7), 6-1, 6-4 loss to No. 14 Bencic.
Bouchard, Zhao and Sebov are all planning to play the 2023 Australian Open qualifying.
Gabriela Dabrowski had one other stellar yr in doubles. It didn’t start nicely as she and Mexican accomplice Giuliana Olmos went 1-5 on the season begin however issues modified once they reached the semi-finals in Indian Wells in March – after which acquired sizzling through the clay-court season. They received the WTA 1000 in Madrid and adopted that up with a runner-up end within the Rome WTA 1000.
Their greatest results of a disappointing Grand Slam yr was a quarter-final on the US Open. However issues picked up for Dabrowski in September as she received the WTA 250 occasion in Chennai, India, with Luisa Stefani of Brazil (the one match all yr with out Olmos) after which the WTA 500 in Tokyo with Olmos.
She and Olmos certified for the WTA Finals in Fort Value, Texas, however had been eradicated within the round-robin part after recording only one win – 7-6(5), 2-6, [12-10] over Latvian Jelena Ostapenko and Lyudmyla Kichenok of Ukraine.
Dabrowski completed 2022 ranked No. 7 and had a neat (twice as many wins as losses) 42-21 match document, incomes $588,575 U.S. in prize cash.
There’s a promising crop of younger Canadian women rising, led by Victoria Mboko and Kayla Cross, each from Toronto.
Mboko ranks No. 6 within the ITF Junior rankings and reached the semi-finals of Wimbledon and the US Open junior occasions. In February, she received 5 matches with out shedding a set to seize the ITF Grade 1 match in Porto Alegre, Brazil. A strong participant, her massive breakthrough got here in July when she received the ITF $25,000 match in Saskatoon, beating her ultimate 4 opponents convincingly in straight units – at simply age 15. She turned 16 on August 26 and is already No. 487 within the WTA rankings.
Cross is a gritty lefty who made it to the third spherical of each the Wimbledon and US Open junior occasions. Her ITF junior rating is No. 22.
Additionally a proficient doubles participant, she received the $25,000 Saskatoon ITF occasion in July with Serbian Katarina Kozarov and was runner-up with compatriot Marina Stakusic on the $60,000 ITF in Calgary in November.
Within the juniors, she and Mboko received titles in Traralgon, Australia, in January, in Porto Allegre, Brazil, in February and Roehampon, England, in July and had been runners-up in each the Australian Open and Wimbledon junior occasions. The 17-year-old’s WTA rankings are No. 715 in singles and No. 465 in doubles.
Characteristic Picture: Martin Sidorjak
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