Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

A new subforum created to discuss Sania Mirza. As a lot of the other tennis player threads were getting overloaded, thus a new forum to discuss Sania Mirza

Moderator: Moderators

User avatar
Sandeep
Moderators
Moderators
Posts: 10722
Joined: Sun Sep 21, 2003 4:21 pm
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Been thanked: 1 time
Contact:

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by Sandeep »

I am now worried that Sania is missing the invaluable matches against the top players on WTA circuit. I would have preferred WTA qualifiers over the ITF tournaments. I don't see a point why Sania is playing these ITF tournaments?
User avatar
prasen9
Member
Member
Posts: 19124
Joined: Thu Jan 02, 2003 8:49 pm
Please enter the middle number: 1
Location: State College, PA
Has thanked: 25 times
Been thanked: 8 times
Contact:

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by prasen9 »

To get a base of points so that she will get direct entries in the future in WTA tournaments. I see your point and agree with it too to some extent. I think Somdev should play a few more challengers and Sania a few less, but, that is their choice.
akmohanty
Member
Member
Posts: 1809
Joined: Sat Jul 30, 2005 10:41 pm

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by akmohanty »

playing ITFs gives her more match practice and confidence instead of facing a top player straightaway and losing in the very first round. with these runs in the ITFs, she would hopefully be improving her rankings well enough to be entering the main draws of WTA tournaments after the US Open.
User avatar
Saniapower
Member
Member
Posts: 3450
Joined: Tue May 05, 2009 6:45 pm
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by Saniapower »

prasen9 wrote:To get a base of points so that she will get direct entries in the future in WTA tournaments. I see your point and agree with it too to some extent. I think Somdev should play a few more challengers and Sania a few less, but, that is their choice.

No.Somdev can play these challengers any time he wants. He is doing the right thing playing the quali of atp events. he has qualified for 2 events and even won 2 rounds of the MD. In the process he has tested himself against some top players. Of course he could not defend all his points from last year's challengers but still a good effort. He can gain points by playing challengers later.

Sania also needs to win 3 / or 4 big challengers to take her in the top 50 when she can get direct entry in the MD of premier wta events. there is no justification to face Venus in the 1st round after winning 3 quali matches and bowing out without achieving anything and resting rest of the week.

Image
User avatar
prasen9
Member
Member
Posts: 19124
Joined: Thu Jan 02, 2003 8:49 pm
Please enter the middle number: 1
Location: State College, PA
Has thanked: 25 times
Been thanked: 8 times
Contact:

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by prasen9 »

Saniapower wrote: No.Somdev can play these challengers any time he wants. ... He can gain points by playing challengers later. ...
So can Sania.
Sania also needs to win 3 / or 4 big challengers to take her in the top 50 when she can get direct entry in the MD of premier wta events. there is no justification to face Venus in the 1st round after winning 3 quali matches and bowing out without achieving anything and resting rest of the week.
By this logic, Somdev would also have to win 2-3 quali matches and then can face Nadal or Roddick or such-likes in the first round and get pretty much nothing. As a matter of fact, by this logic, any non-seeded player can face Venus in the first round and direct entries would not have even the quali wins, so they should run away from playing WTA events and go to challengers.

My observation was based on the belief that Sania Mirza is a bona-fide WTA-level player and currently Somdev is a challenger-level player. Hence, Sania should play at her level and try the WTA-qualies more, and, Somdev should excel at his level and then move up to the ATP tournaments. Note I am saying that they should both play a mix of challengers and WTA/ATP-qualies. For example, I would prefer Sania playing the 100k+H Bronx challenger where she is #13 in the entry list, but not the 50k Lexington one. That week she would have had a direct entry in Europe on hard-court while returning from India to the US but chose to play the weaker KY tournament and consequently missed Stanford qualies the next week.
User avatar
Sandeep
Moderators
Moderators
Posts: 10722
Joined: Sun Sep 21, 2003 4:21 pm
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Been thanked: 1 time
Contact:

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by Sandeep »

playing ITFs gives her more match practice and confidence instead of facing a top player straightaway and losing in the very first round. with these runs in the ITFs, she would hopefully be improving her rankings well enough to be entering the main draws of WTA tournaments after the US Open
She is an experienced pro now and I doubt if the confidence of winning an ITF tournament will help her win matches at WTA level. It is a different thing all together if she is an upcoming player like Somdev. I mean, if she is looking at hanging around 60s and 70s, playing challengers is fines. The way I look at it she missed opportunities to win two WTA tournaments in the last two weeks. As I have mentioned in Somdev's thread too, Challengers can wait. If her rank falls down so badly that she can't play the qualifiers then I am fine with these challengers but otherwise WTA tournaments are where she should be.
User avatar
jayakris
Moderators
Moderators
Posts: 34757
Joined: Mon Dec 16, 2002 7:24 am
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Irvine, CA, USA
Has thanked: 10 times
Been thanked: 1 time
Contact:

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by jayakris »

Sandeep,

If she didn't feel that she NEEDED challenger matches, you think she would have taken the trouble to do it?? .. It is no fun for a tour player, especially somebody of such a high profile who can make money just walking around in India, to go and play challengers. The tour players hate playing challengers .. Nobody picking you up from the hotel and taking you to the event .. You will be lucky if you get sandwiches in the players' lounges .. You have to play 4 or 5 matches for any worthwhile points, and you get career challenger players all ready put their eveything into getting their career wins against you .. It is no fun at all, and that is why it is quite rare for tour players to go 9-1 in challenger matches when they try to do it.

If she felt she needed challenger matches (for reasons only known to her), let us leave it to her to make the call. You really don't think she wants to play a whole lot of challengers and waste so many weeks to just about hang around in the top-75, do you?? ... Of course you cannot do that with challengers, and she knows it -- at best you can hang around in the 125, that's it .. You think that is what she is looking for, now? .. She is doing it hardly a month after her engagement, to boot.

To me, it looks like she took a hard decision to play some events for tennis reasons (and I find no other reason!). We should be showing our understanding (at least), if not respect, to somebody who TAKES TROUBLE rather than take the easier way out (because you know, playing the cozy tour events and waiting for the break, especially if you feel your game needs work, IS the easy way out!!) ..

Jay
User avatar
prasen9
Member
Member
Posts: 19124
Joined: Thu Jan 02, 2003 8:49 pm
Please enter the middle number: 1
Location: State College, PA
Has thanked: 25 times
Been thanked: 8 times
Contact:

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by prasen9 »

jayakris wrote:She is doing it hardly a month after her engagement, to boot.
What is so big or relevant about the engagement (ceremony)? I thought that they had decided earlier and they did the ceremony at a convenient time. I don't really understand how/why that should be a factor for anything. The other comments may have some validity, hence, not commenting on that.
User avatar
jayakris
Moderators
Moderators
Posts: 34757
Joined: Mon Dec 16, 2002 7:24 am
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Irvine, CA, USA
Has thanked: 10 times
Been thanked: 1 time
Contact:

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by jayakris »

... Actually the engagement would not have much relevance in the normal case, except for the fact that some of us had worried that she might be thinking beyond tennis when this angagement thing happened. Not that it indicated a conscious decision to ease off the pedal in her tennis focus, but I felt there was a possibility of an unspoken thought in her that she was not going places in her tennis. I was really looking for a sign that she was still dead serious about pushing herself a bit more. Doing something like two challengers soon after gave me the sense that she still has the fire in the belly.

.. In other words, the relevance is rather convoluted, and only a few might see it.

Jay
User avatar
Sandeep
Moderators
Moderators
Posts: 10722
Joined: Sun Sep 21, 2003 4:21 pm
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Been thanked: 1 time
Contact:

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by Sandeep »

If she didn't feel that she NEEDED challenger matches, you think she would have taken the trouble to do it??
Obviously she felt the need and that is why she is playing. I am not commenting on her decision, but I am just wondering why she has skipped WTA qualifiers for challengers?
To me, it looks like she took a hard decision to play some events for tennis reasons (and I find no other reason!)
Jay, can you be specific? What are the tennis reasons that are more important at challenger level which she couldn't at WTA tour? I am not blaming or showing disrespect towards Sania for the decision, I am just failing to understand why she took this decision!
User avatar
prasen9
Member
Member
Posts: 19124
Joined: Thu Jan 02, 2003 8:49 pm
Please enter the middle number: 1
Location: State College, PA
Has thanked: 25 times
Been thanked: 8 times
Contact:

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by prasen9 »

One reason could be that she wanted more match practice.
User avatar
jayakris
Moderators
Moderators
Posts: 34757
Joined: Mon Dec 16, 2002 7:24 am
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5
Location: Irvine, CA, USA
Has thanked: 10 times
Been thanked: 1 time
Contact:

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by jayakris »

Sandeep: just what prasen said. More matches.

Probably trying to get some rhythm in something or other. The game does deteriorate sometimes when you play the WTA tour and go one or two and out for a while .. Who knows, may be she wanted to hit some loopy balls and improve her defense; may be she wants to try some second serve placements to lesser-percentage areas or try some kick serves and see if they work against some decent players .. May be she wants to try that BHCC-EAC a few times and get even more acute angles. May be simply trying to extend some rallies to see if she can delay the FH winner. Possibly she felt that she didn't have the luxury to try those at the WTA level because she would lose and start dropping from 80s back below 100 soon in ranking. At the challengers, she can freely try some things even if she loses a majority of say 20 odd points from such experimentation, because she knws she could start pummelling them with the forehands when she needs and win.

Even in her junior days, she improved a lot and developed some uniquely strong weapons, because she had the guts to try things others would not try, without the fear of losing some matches - not because some great coaching was teaching her to develop her game (my view). The up and down matches were often the case with Sania then too.

All I am saying is that I find nothing other than such reasons for her to take the trouble to go to challengers. I don't think she suddenly felt she could amass a lot of cheap points from chellengers and move up. If she was in the 120s or something, that made some sense, but not from #85 .. That's what I am guessing.

Jay
User avatar
Saniapower
Member
Member
Posts: 3450
Joined: Tue May 05, 2009 6:45 pm
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by Saniapower »

prasen9 wrote:
So can Sania.

By this logic, Somdev would also have to win 2-3 quali matches and then can face Nadal or Roddick or such-likes in the first round and get pretty much nothing. As a matter of fact, by this logic, any non-seeded player can face Venus in the first round and direct entries would not have even the quali wins, so they should run away from playing WTA events and go to challengers.

My observation was based on the belief that Sania Mirza is a bona-fide WTA-level player and currently Somdev is a challenger-level player. Hence, Sania should play at her level and try the WTA-qualies more, and, Somdev should excel at his level and then move up to the ATP tournaments. Note I am saying that they should both play a mix of challengers and WTA/ATP-qualies. For example, I would prefer Sania playing the 100k+H Bronx challenger where she is #13 in the entry list, but not the 50k Lexington one. That week she would have had a direct entry in Europe on hard-court while returning from India to the US but chose to play the weaker KY tournament and consequently missed Stanford qualies the next week.
Why u compare Somdev with Sania? Sania reached career high #27. Somdev never reached such a high level in atp circuit. How many Challengers Somdev won so far? Sania will win 9 out of 10 challengers.Somdev will lose half of them in 1st and 2nd round. Best he can reach 1 final. That’s all. It is only possible for Sania and someone who is a top 50 player in reality but fallen out of 100 due to injury, to get themselves back where once they used to belong in 6 weeks time I suppose. But it could take years for Somdev to reach there but I am afraid he will never reach there in his entire life. So don’t bring this comparison. Somdev gets very few opportunities to play those atp events and so he is taking his chances. This is Something like collecting 20 points from a challenger or getting 12 points from the quail. The choice is between these two.

YOU want to see Sania’s name in the MD of wta events among others like Venus,Serena,Safina,Sharapova? I also want this. Everybody will love to see her name there. In fact Sania is dying to to play with Venus, Maria But it will not happen in 2009(before uso). Her current ranking is the big obstacle. It will happen in 2010,2011,2012,2013,2014,2015 and so on. It can happen after her marriage. It can even happen after she having 2 kids.But I don’t see it happening in 2009(before uso). But again nothing is impossible in sports. Suppose she beats venus n the 1st round then Serena and then overcomes Maria in the 3rd round and she goes deep in the draw, reaches the final and wins her 2nd wta tournament beating Bartoli or Pennetta in the final whom she already beaten in in the past. And also improves her ranking significantly so that she will not worry about getting entry in future tournaments. But YOU know this is a very risky game and she just doesn’t want to play this game right now.Instead she has chosen the safest path to get back in top 50 or top 40 so that she can bypass the quail and get direct entry weeks after weeks, tournaments after tournaments. In that case if she loses early in one tournament it will not hamper her entry in the next tournament. But now if she cant gain some points then she will have to face same entry problem in future. So she has taken the right decision and it has gone according to the plan. She has won one Challenger reached final of another, gained lot of points,back in top75. You will get almost as many points by winning a 75k challenger as u get reaching q-f of a wta event. But again she will not play 10k itf. Instead she will be playing toronto qualies. So she is also mixing it. So overall excellent decision. But again YOU can say that Maria Sharapova has also fallen outside top 50 But she is playing wta and not itf . Yes right decision. Maria can take wildcard or she can play quail, she can beat anybody to reach semis and final. It’s her opponents who will be worried that such an unseeded player is on their half of draw. ‘coz Maria is a multiple slam winner and in reality a top 3 player and on her day she can crush just anybody. She doesn’t need to worry about her ranking.So u cant compare Maria and Sania. Sania is on a mission now and let her complete it.

TODAY’S PAIN IS TOMORROW'S GAIN
User avatar
Saniapower
Member
Member
Posts: 3450
Joined: Tue May 05, 2009 6:45 pm
Antispam: No
Please enter the middle number: 5

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by Saniapower »

Sandeep wrote:
Obviously she felt the need and that is why she is playing. I am not commenting on her decision, but I am just wondering why she has skipped WTA qualifiers for challengers?
Bcoz in challengers this is almost a certainity that she can gain points(by reaching final / winning)
but on the contrary in wta events it is uncertain and if she cant improve her ranking then she will need to play quali in every tournament and if she steadily falls behind in ranking then in future her grand slam participation will be in jeopardy.
User avatar
prasen9
Member
Member
Posts: 19124
Joined: Thu Jan 02, 2003 8:49 pm
Please enter the middle number: 1
Location: State College, PA
Has thanked: 25 times
Been thanked: 8 times
Contact:

Re: Discussion on Sania's WTA Ranking

Post by prasen9 »

Saniapower wrote: Why u compare Somdev with Sania?
Why can one not compare? Read what I said. I said that their strategies should be different. Nowhere did I say they should do the same thing.
Post Reply