9/15/2009

Week #35-36: Mommy Clijsters wins the US Open in her comeback

After retiring in 2007 and becoming a mother last year, former WTA #1 Kim Clijsters came back to the WTA Tour a month ago, and in just the third tournament after coming back, she has captured the 2nd Grand Slam title of her career at the US Open, where she already got the title in 2005. In the final Clijsters defeated a solid Caroline Wozniacki, who was the only seed to reach the quarter-finals in the upper half of the draw and took advance of the upsets to reach her first Grand Slam final.

Nevertheless, the match of the tournament was the semifinal between Clijsters and WTA #2 Serena Williams. With 6/4 6/5 15-30 for Clijsters, Williams was called a foot fault which meant two match points for Clijsters, lost her nerves and threatened the lineswoman, for which she was given a penalty point which meant the victory for Clijsters. Young Belgian Yanina Wickmayer took advance of the early defeats of WTA #1 Dinara Safina (upsetted by Petra Kvitova) and WTA #5 Jelena Jankovic (upsetted by Yaroslava Shvedova) to progress to the semifinals just facing a Top-40 (WTA #16 Virginie Razzano) on her way.

Besides Clijsters, 17 year old American Melanie Oudin hit the headlines after an amazing run upsetting four Russian players, including WTA #4 Elena Dementieva, former WTA #1 Maria Sharapova, and WTA #13 Nadia Petrova before losing to Wozniacki in the quarter-finals. Another surprising quarter-finalist was Katerina Bondarenko, who enjoyed an easy draw after upsetting Ana Ivanovic in the 1st round. Na Li and Flavia Pennetta completed the quarter-finals.

In the doubles, Serena Williams recovered from her controversial defeat in the semifinal to capture the title along with sister Venus defeating World's #1 team Cara Black and Liezel Huber in the final.

US Open (New York, USA), Grand Slam, $7,456,000
Singles final: Kim Clijsters (BEL) def Caroline Wozniacki (DEN) 7/5 6/4
Doubles final: S.Williams(USA)/V.Williams(USA) vs C.Black(ZIM)/L.Huber(USA) 6/2 6/2
Mixed doubles final: C.Gullickson(USA)/T.Parrot(USA) def C.Black(ZIM)/L.Paes(IND) 6/2 6/4

No comments: