The Hindu : Sport : Sania equals career-best ranking

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Tuesday, Jul 31, 2007
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Sania equals career-best ranking

Special Correspondent

Sania needs about 340 more points to break into the top-20
She has not beaten any top-10 player this season so far

NEW DELHI: She is playing some of the best tennis of her career, and it is no surprise that Sania Mirza is ready to jump up from her career-best ranking of No.31 in the world.

In fact, the surprise is that she has not bettered it already, much against the intelligent calculations of the experts.

The 20-year-old has enjoyed two weeks of outstanding success against quality players on the hardcourts of the United States, to equal her best rank of 31 that she had first reached in October 2005 while providing a new face for women’s tennis.

Stumbling block

World No.6 Anna Chakvetadze of Russia was the stumbling block both times at Cincinnati and Stanford, but Sania has done very well to collect 255 WTA points from the two tournaments to be ready for more in the run-up to the U.S. Open.

A below par fare in the U.S. circuit last year when she won a mere six singles matches in seven weeks and gathered only 137 WTA points means that Sania has everything to gain henceforth.

Sania had shown the world that she was quite at home on the hardcourts of the U.S., two years back, by amassing 416 WTA points by winning 16 of her 22 matches, making the fourth round of the U.S. Open before bowing to the Wimbledon champion Maria Sharapova.

She may not have beaten any top-10 player this season so far, but Sania has impressed her fans with her consistently brilliant play against the top-20 players like Tatiana Golovin, Patty Schnyder and Sybille Bammer. Sania needs about 340 more points to break into the top-20, which has been a realistic target for quite long, though the pessimistic followers may have lost heart when she was finding it a tough grind on the Tour at some stage.

If she is in good physical fitness and stroking at her fluent best, Sania is definitely a top-20 material. She can take it from there once she reaches that level with added maturity in her game and approach.

Having already collected close to $250,000 in prize money this season, it does not pinch Sania much to have a competent coach travelling with her, in the renowned Gabriel Urpi of Spain, to help her tackle the top players of the world with greater confidence.

She takes on her doubles partner, the 12th seeded Shahar Peer of Israel in the first round of the $1,340,000 Acura Classic this week at San Diego. A good run there may see her battle top players like Dinara Safina and Maria Sharapova.

The blitzkrieg in singles has overshadowed the fact that Sania has already won three Tour doubles title this season, including the one on Sunday, to take her career tally to six. She is ranked 26 in doubles, three places away from her best rank that she had enjoyed in January this year.

With 1296 doubles points in her kitty, Sania can actually aspire to reach the top-10 before the season runs out.

If singles takes a toll on her doubles, which it has not so far, Sania’s fans would only be too pleased, as everyone is eagerly expecting her to set new standards for Indian women’s tennis in the near future.

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