Tag: Tennis

18^th seed Svetlana Kuznetsova was involved in a thrilling match with Sabine Lisicki, who somehow fought back from a set and two games down to claim the victory on Saturday.

Kuznetsova will look back on the third round match and wonder how she let her dominant position slip, but Lisicki must take a lot of the credit for such a spirited performance. The Russian closed out a scrappy first set in just 28 minutes, which saw the opening 5 games all go against the serve, before Svetlana managed to hold hers and continue to break her opponent.

The second set look destined to be similar when Kuznetsova built up a 3-1 lead over the 14^th seed with an early break. But at this point the German raised her game and broke back in both the 6^th and 10^th games to claim the second set 6-4.

The match was building up into an intriguing third set, and again it was finely balanced at the start of this set. However, in the fourth game, Kuznetsova carelessly double faulted to hand her opponent the opportunity to break her serve, and the nerves got to her as she fired a forehand long. Lisicki broke again in the 6^th game only to be broken back instantly, but the German was composed enough to take her 7^th break of serve to win the final set 6-2.

The comeback was one of the best so far at this year’s Australian Open, but Kuznetsova will be disappointed not to have taken the opportunity to win against an opponent seeded only four places above her in the competition. The Russian has performed poorly at the grand slams in the past year, her best result in 2011 being an appearance at the quarterfinals of the French Open, which she won in 2009. The 26-year old is still capable of some fantastic tennis, but needs to regain some of the confidence that was evident during her best period when she broke through as a young star in 2003 and 2004.

Former women’s tennis world number two player Svetlana Kuznetsova has hired a new coach ahead of the upcoming calendar season of 2012 in an attempt to crack the top ten of the world ranking once again. The Russian, who has been a Grand Slam winner on two occasions has not been having the best of times on the court over the last few seasons and almost fell off the radar after becoming one of the top tennis players in the world in the middle of the decade.

Olga Morozova, who has been the coach of another Russian tennis player Elena Dementieva as well as some British juniors, has been hired by the Russian to take her back to glory. Morozova had coached Kuznetsova for a brief spell during the 2008 season but it was not confirmed either by the player or the coach’s representatives whether the team will work together permanently or this is only a temporary solution. Svetlana Kuznetsova reached a career high world number two position in September 2007 after winning the 2004 US Open title and followed it up with success in the French Open in 2009.

But since then, Kuznetsova was nowhere near the top 10 and was overshadowed by the emergence of young players like Carolina Wozniacki, Victoria Azarenka and Petra Kvitova. She is currently ranked outside the top 20 in the WTA ratings, sitting in the 21st position as she is gearing up for the first Grand Slam of the season, the Australian Open.

The last couple of years has seen her change coaches plenty of times, experimenting with a new coach but this time, she has gone back and hired someone she has worked with before and Svetlana Kuznetsova is hoping that this new partnership can get her back to the top 10 by the end of the season.