Tennis
DJOKOVIC AND SERENA WILLIAMS AMONG FAVOURITES FOR AUSTRALIAN OPEN TITLES
BY MICHAEL PAVITT.
Serbia’s Novak Djokovic and the United
States’ Serena Williams will head into the Australian Open as favourites to win
the opening Grand Slam event of the tennis season.
Neither will head into the tournament as the defending champion, despite having won the first Grand Slam of the year on six and seven occasions respectively.
World number one Djokovic suffered a shock defeat at last year’s tournament as he continued his recovery from a long standing elbow injury.
The Serbian triumphed at Wimbledon last year, while his upturn in form continued with victory at the US Open.
The top seed will begin his campaign with a match against American qualifier Mitchell Krueger.
Roger Federer will also hope to add to his six Australian Open titles, with the Swiss star having triumphed for the past two years in Melbourne.
The 37-year-old begins as the third seed, with Uzbekistan’s Denis Istomin set to provide his first round challenge.
Spain’s Rafael Nadal is seeded second, while ATP World Tour Finals winner Alexander Zverev is the fourth favourite as the German seeks his first Grand Slam title.
While the quartet will hope to take the headlines at the end of the tournament, the build-up has been dominated by Andy Murray’s retirement announcement due to an ongoing hip problem.
The Briton, a three-time Grand Slam winner, has targeted Wimbledon as the “end point” of his career.
He has admitted that hip pain could mean the Australian Open, where he has been a five-time runner-up, could prove his final event, however.
Murray has been handed a tough first round assignment, with Spain’s Roberto Bautista Agut heading into their match as favourite to advance.
The women’s draw is headlined by Williams, who will be seeking a first Grand Slam title since the 2017 Australian Open.
The American missed the next four Grand Slam events due to pregnancy and the birth of her first child.
She made her Grand Slam return at last year’s French Open and began to show her best form at the US Open, where Williams reached the final before losing to Japan’s Naomi Osaka in controversial fashion.
The American will be among the favourites to reach the final in Melbourne and she will begin her campaign against Germany’s Tatjana Maria.
Williams could be on collision course to face tournament top seed Simona Halep, with the Romanian currently seeking to build on her maiden Grand Slam triumph last year at the French Open.
The world number one and last year’s runner-up will face Estonia’s Kaia Kanepi in the first round.
Denmark’s Caroline Wozniacki is the defending champion and is seeded third heading into the tournament.
Germany’s Angelique Kerber, the 2016 winner, starts as the second seed.
Argentina’s 36-year-old Marco Trungelliti proved tennis dreams do not come with an expiration date when he became the oldest first-time tour-level finalist in the Open Era after beating the top seed at the Grand Prix Hassan II semi-finals in Marrakech on Saturday.
Trungelliti, who came through the tournament’s qualifiers, upset Italy’s defending champion Luciano Darderi 6-4 7-6(2) to break the previous record held by Victor Estrella Burgos of the Dominican Republic, who reached his first final aged 34 years in 2015.
Darderi, ranked 19 in the world, was only six-years-old when Trungelliti turned pro in 2008. With the victory, Trungelliti secured just his second career top-20 win.
“Of course, I believed it, that’s one of the reasons that I’m here. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be possible,” Trungelliti said in the on-court interview.
“I’ve worked a lot, me and my team and also my wife, my kid. We all believed in breaking the record basically and that’s exactly what we have done now.”
The milestone caps a remarkable journey for Trungelliti, who made his first ATP Tour semi-final in 2018 in Umag, Croatia – 402 weeks ago.
Having entered the tournament ranked 117 in the world, Trungelliti’s breakthrough week has already guaranteed he will crack the top 100 for the first time. He is currently ranked number 75 in the live rankings.
“It’s been happening the whole week, leaving the court with a victory,” added Trungelliti, who has dropped only one set at the tournament. “So hopefully (there) is one more to go.”
He will face Rafael Jodar on Sunday after the Spaniard prevented an all-Argentine final with a 6-2 6-1 victory over Camilo Ugo Carabelli.
-Reuters
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Serena Williams has been listed as eligible to return to tennis by the sport’s drug-testing body (ITIA) as of February 22, though it remains unclear whether the 23-time Grand Slam champion will make a stunning comeback to the women’s tour.
The 44-year-old raised eyebrows late last year after rejoining the tennis anti-doping testing pool, though she denied at the time the move signalled she was preparing to return to the sport she dominated for nearly two decades.
She reignited speculation last month when she deflected questions about a possible return during an appearance on NBC’s “Today” show.
The Women’s Tennis Association did not immediately respond to a request for comment outside normal business hours.
Williams, who won her last Grand Slam singles title in 2017, has not competed since the 2022 U.S. Open.
-Reuters
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Serena Williams has re-entered the tennis anti-doping testing pool but the 23-times Grand Slam champion denied on Tuesday that the move had anything to do with her making a return to the sport she dominated for nearly two decades.
The International Tennis Integrity Agency confirmed to Reuters that Williams, who has not competed since the 2022 U.S. Open, was among the list of players in its testing pool, which requires individuals to provide their whereabouts at any given time, every day, and participate in random testing
But as the story of 44-year-old Williams’ inclusion on the list, first reported earlier on Tuesday by The Athletic, gained traction and sparked talk about her potential return, the tennis great took to social media to deny a comeback was in her plans.
“Omg yall I’m NOT coming back. This wildfire is crazy,” Williams wrote on X.
Her agent did not immediately respond to an email from Reuters asking why the player had re-entered the testing pool.
Williams’ name appears on the ITIA website’s list of retired players and would be able to return to a sanctioned event after making herself available for out-of-competition testing for at least six months.
Last week former world number one Williams posted a series of photos on Instagram showing herself on a tennis court with her youngest daughter, Adira River, whom she gave birth to in August 2023.
In August 2022, ahead of her final U.S. Open, Williams announced in a Vogue article that she was “evolving away from tennis.”
Williams, who won her last Grand Slam singles title in 2017, had been chasing an elusive 24th crown that would have drawn her level with Australian Margaret Court, who holds the record.
The American came tantalisingly close to achieving that feat, featuring in four major finals since giving birth to her first daughter, Olympia, in 2017.
-Reuters
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