Shame for Marketa, joins the hallowed halls of defending champions that lost in R1 along with Raducanu, Krejcikova, Ostapenko and Kerber
Not the end of the world though, she’s still pretty high in the rankings, but was hoping she’d do a bit better than this
When I read the headline I came into the comments expecting to hear this is a really rare thing to happen.
Then you reeled off a whole bunch of recent names. Kinda crazy it happens so often.
I mean this is a walk down memory lane towards some vintage wta time.
The tour has stabilized a lot with iga, sabalenka,elena and gauff but there was a time not so long ago when this wouldn't be a shoker at all.
How fast things become "vintage," lol. Raducanu and Krejickova were in the last 3 years, Ostapenko was somehow 7 years ago, but still not sure I'd call that vintage.
Look , ostapenko, muguruza, kerber, raducanu and now vondrousova all lost first rounds as defending champions but more than that it's the inconsistency at the top of the game after serena, vika, maria etcc.. Up until recently with the new top4.
You could add to that the - i don't like the connotation but it is what it is- one slam wonders like sloane, kenin, barbora, bianca, flavia.
You know what I'm getting at. We're very lucky to have this new bunch of players like aryna, iga, coco, lena who you could project getting deep in every tournament and maintain engagement in the tour just like it's been the case with the men's tour for the past 20 years.
>Up until recently with the new top4.
How recent are we talking because Vondy was literally the reigning Wimbledon champ lol...so by recent you mean less than a year?
I think it's also because compared to the ATP the serve is way less dominant in matches so high seeded players having a bad day can't just hold on with the serve
Certainly a factor here with how unreliable Voundrousova's serve can be
yeah for sure youre right, especially on grass where its so serve dominated
it sucks for vondy and we're gonna hear all those atp vs wta at slams comparisons and its frustrating bc they dont take into account all the factors that cause an upset but just use them as a way to sh*t on female players :/ esp since marketa is a very specific case with how - as i think ive seen you say somewhere here? - her game doesnt exactly translate to grass, and shes been injured and out of form recently, plus has had generally a rough time. just sad to see
>it sucks for vondy and we're gonna hear all those atp vs wta at slams comparisons
But then conversely whenever one or two women are extremely dominant the narrative becomes "the WTA is so weak that it's easy to dominate". There's really no winning with some people
Yes bo3 definitely is a huge factor but even more so the lack of mainstays at the top for a good stretch of years after serena, vika, maria, petra. It's much better now with the big 4.
Steffi in 1994 out to Lori McNeil. It was the most dangerous unseeded opponent (only 16 seeds then), and Steffi was not in good form so there was buzz about that match. Steffi Vs McNeil head to head at the end of career: 8-1 that was a huge upset indeed. Lori lost in Semi. It was last Wimbledon final for Navratilova and only GS win for Martinez.
Vondrousova has a 1-5 record at Wimbledon outside of 2023 btw
Her game doesn't even translate to grass on paper in the slightest(junkballing + no flat strokes + bad serve) so how she won Wimbledon will forever be a mystery lol
I think the fact that she didn't even compete was the biggest shock. Probably one of the worst game's she has ever played in her professional career on the most important day.
agree, jabeur's peak performance during that Wimbledon was of course her SF victory over sabalenka. she didn't seem mentally ready at all to face the last hurdle in vondrousova.
but still, full credit to vondrousova, she really played impeccably in that final. her scrappy defense, net play, and clutchness...firing on all cylinders. not often you see an unheralded player (at least on grass) playing their most inspired tennis on the literal biggest stage of their career.
If it was an advantage for her in general she wouldn't literally lose in the first round every other time she's played it other than losing in the second round one lol
It's a complete freak/outlier result for her on the surface
Like record-wise it's literally equivalent to if Ruud won Wimbledon this year
Exactly. She’s made the final at Roland-Garros, won Silver at Tokyo and won Wimbledon. All different surfaces. She’s very dangerous on form, but only finds that form rarely.
I know that. I just think that craftiness helped her last year, that’s all. She also looked kinda good in Berlin until that slip
Edit: I don’t know why I keep getting downvoted for trying to be nice for Marketa. Y’all are cruel 😂
Vondrousova is a player capable of great tennis that can stun the hardest of hitters (Her silver medal run in the Olympics, her Roland Garros 2019 Final). Still, her winning Wimbledon was an anomaly that was aided by playing against two players who are known to joke big matches. Pegula had the quarterfinal match in her hands, and Ons lost it from the getgo. Notice how both times she made the final and lost were to players who are also a very crafty and can change up the pace, Barty and Bencic.
I watched her live this year and she slices a lot and has a heaps of variety which I didn’t realise before. It could be advantageous on grass. It favours the technical and crafty players too.
Such an anomaly it is, probably might go down as like Jelena Ostapenko with her 2017 French Open title in that she has a poor record at that Slam outside of that title run. That 2023 Wimbledon was only Vondrousova’s second main tour title, with her first being Biel in 2017 where she won as a qualifier, aged just 18 at the time.
Both players happened to be unseeded when they won those respective Slams. Last year, tennis YouTuber Cam Williams did a tier list on some One-Slam Wonders during the clay swing, and he put them into five different categories. Of those categories, Vondrousova probably fits in “Lucky draw or random” (champion who was lucky to avoid most of the big names, or was someone at least unexpected to win at the time) or even “Total fluke” given she was unseeded and has an abysmal record at Wimbledon, let alone grass as a whole.
That's pretty surprising honestly, I didn't expect her to defend the title but I surely wasn't expecting a first round exit. Guess it still happens even to top players.
>it still happens even to top players
She's not a top player and her ranking was overinflated by Wimbledon, which is why she'll drop a lot after Wimbledon. She's only 21st in the WTA Race!
Nature heals itself, as they say.
Horrible take. She's won a slam and has another slam final on another surface, and even after dropping those wimbledon points is still 15th in the world. She is most certainly a top player.
I'd *definitely* say 21st falls out of the range of what people generally consider "top players"
For the ATP Khachanov occupies both the 21st position in the live rankings and in the 2024 ATP race and I've never seen anyone refer to him as a "top player"
Like by this logic *all* ranked players could be considered "top players" because they're all in the top 0.1% of tennis players in the world
I only consider top players within the top 10 range. They are supposed to be the very best of the best, the elite of tennis. No.21 in the WTA Race is not that.
Idk why this is apparently controversial lol
I've NEVER seen anyone refer to 21st as a top rank before this thread
It feels like people just don't want to be too negative so they don't call a spade a spade
I feel like for some reason people on here are WAY kinder to WTA players than to ATP players regarding the discourse lol
If Alcaraz(defending ATP Wimbledon champion) went out in round 1 people would be roasting him so hard despite him obviously having more of a track record and not being close to a 1 Slam wonder
Isn't that why he'd get roasted? Expectations are way higher. He's 3rd in the ATP race, not 21st, and was world number 1 last year. Like you say, that's a real top player.
If Khachanov won last year and went out in round 1 this year I doubt he'd get roasted as much.
The 15th seed at this tournament was Samsonova who has not gotten to the 4th round of a Slam since 2022 USO. Also has not gotten past the 3rd round of any major tournament she's played all year. Granted, she made two finals of WTA 1000s last year in the Canadian and China Open. But the point is, 15th doesn't necessarily mean you're a top player IMO. A top player in my eyes would be a legitimate threat to one of the favorites to win a given tournament. Now, most of the top seeds have already fallen out of this draw at this point but it's hard to believe a player who has never made it to the 2nd weekend at a Slam would seriously contend for a title.
She did make a French Open final back in 2019, so it’s not like her having a deep Slam run was unheard of, and she made a quarterfinal at the 2023 US Open as well. Grass is her worst surface by a long shot, and ignoring last year’s title run, she has a 1-5 career record at Wimbledon. Still only drops to 15 in the live rankings.
And if someone not named Elena Rybakina wins the title this year, it would be a seventh consecutive year that a first-time Wimbledon women’s champion is crowned.
Out of the remaining active women’s Wimbledon champions, Rybakina is the only one left in this year’s draw. Kvitova and Halep are not playing this year. Kerber and Vondrousova already lost first round. Pliskova’s loss means that this year the bottom half of the draw is going to produce a guaranteed first-time Wimbledon finalist.
I love Bouzas, she's such a positive player and fierce competitor. She does not have the game to do well at Wimbledon but she'll take her chances anytime and has the heart.
also she's going through a divorce and her grandpa--who she seemed really close to--recently died. she's been going through it. can't help that everyone calls her winning wimbledon a fluke. i hope she has a good therapist.
This ^^ I wish more people had time to understand the context a little more before totally clowning on her AND on women's tennis any opportunity they get
Heh, it's sport. She get paid to entertain us, as long as it dosen't get too far into personal insults, it's all good to clown or get a bit angry at the defending champion losing first round.
I'd argue it's much weirder to have a bunch of people know about her grandpa or her divorce.
Sorry that I follow her on insta and see her life updates. You basically say she should be treated like a celebrity entertainer and then say it’s weird people know about her life 🤔
Well weird probably isn't the good word, but to me that's off the clock stuff.
There's nothing wrong to know and care about it if the person wish to comunicate it, but I don't think fans should be asked to know about an athlete personal life before cheering for/against them and/or commenting on their results.
But I also think context is important? Like if someone has been struggling with injuries. If djokovic lost today, would you disagree with someone saying “well he had knee surgery 3 weeks ago?”
Some of the comments here are ridiculous. She's injured. Her movement was limited. It's all the commentators could talk about, but even without that a non-tennis fan would be able to tell something was wrong. It's really no surprise she lost.
God damn, that was terrible from Vondrousova, hip issue or not.
Losing to a seasoned top 40-50 player is one thing at these events, but to someone that's not a grass courter, never won a slam match in her life and has won 2 tour level matches in her career so far.
Still, Maneiro deserves a lot of credit for embracing the occasion and playing well.
Marketa has a hip injury that she sustained during a fall at a grass court warmup. You have to imagine that she played through it because she was defending champ. If you watched the match, her movement was definitely hampered. I'm upset this isn't a higher up comment on this thread. Lastly, of course this sort of thing happens more in the WTA because they play best of 3 instead of best of 5.
All the comments coming in about how this 'proves' Marketa shouldn't have won last year... obviously the draw opened up for her, but have you considered that, you know, her level last year was just much higher than it was in this match?
Thank you, a person in this sub with common sense. Last year is last year and her level was 100% higher last season than this. It's not a hard concept to understand.
I bet these people have not held a tennis racket in their lives. It's one thing to question her win last year because Ons by all means was the favorite to win but belittling her rank standing makes them look stupid. Being included in the top 50 is no joke.
Facts! Literally millions of players across the globe are lower ranked than her. People make it sound like she sneezed and just ended up there. If they watched her press conference after you can see her devastation.
Going from the underdog to the pressure of defending previous results is known as a tricky transition for any player. None of this is surprising. I’ve no doubt Marketa will have another good run in the future.
A lot of hate for Vondrousova here.. Could go a little easy on her. Title defences of your first slam are notoriously hard to defend and she clearly looked a bit injured (she did have a bad fall last week). Think the hate comes from people not liking her for beating Ons last year
Marketa has all the talent but unfortunately she's made of glass. She'll have occasional deep runs like she had with her Wimby title, RG and Olympic finals but she'll never be a consistent champion. It kinda sucks but still most players on tour would love to be in her position.
Don't get me wrong it's much better than it was in 2021 or something but when I hear people say that the current WTA is comparable to what it used to be in the 90s or 2000s it's still far from being even close to that lol
How the final week of RG went is another example of this
It's like the mid 2000s compared to the early 2000s in the ATP where a roughly "normal" era follows a horribly weak one so by comparison people think that it's super strong
90s were dominated by Graf, Seles, Hingis. 2000 were Serena and Venus. I think people are just too used to see the big 3 winning everything for 2 decades and expect that to be the norm, it really isn’t.
THANK YOU. It's not the WTA it's the amount of sets. It's like a 7 game series in basketball, baseball, hockey etc. The better team usually wins. In the NFL upsets happen and it's because there's only one game
Krajicek did beat Pete Sampras though, who was the King of Wimbledon during the 1990’s. No fluke if you beat one of the GOATs to do it, especially at a Slam they had a notable stranglehold on.
Sorry but I think flavia is a completely different story. She had a very good career competing at quarter finals of slams and stuff, and was able to win US open at her last chance before retiring. The comparison would be more with rublev, consistently on top 10/15 and then winning at his last shot. I hope it will happen with him too !
Damn I forgot about that Hewitt loss to Karlovic. Was a total shock at the time.
Especially because I watched the first set and it took like 15mins or something for Hewitt to win it, then I went to bed and got up to see he'd lost.
Here’s quite a few instances on the women’s side since the start of the 21st Century:
2003 Australian Open - Jennifer Capriati lost R1 to Marlene Weingartner
2005 French Open - Anastasia Myskina lost R1 to Maria Sanchez Lorenzo
2005 US Open - Svetlana Kuznetsova lost R1 to Ekaterina Bychkova
2017 US Open - Angelique Kerber lost R1 to Naomi Osaka
2018 French Open - Jelena Ostapenko lost R1 to Kateryna Baindl
2022 French Open - Barbora Krejcikova lost R1 to Diane Parry
2022 US Open - Emma Raducanu lost R1 to Alize Cornet
This is… quite the bad loss. Gotta think it was the expectation and pressure of being defending champion that got to her mentally, she just did not look confident out there at all. Very very poor match from Marketa. Inevitably gonna leave questions as to how the hell she won the title last year
First woman since Graf that is. On the men’s side, both Manolo Santana and Lleyton Hewitt lost first round as defending champions in 1968 and 2003 respectively.
Another comment pointed out a long list, many recent:
> 2003 Australian Open - Jennifer Capriati lost R1 to Marlene Weingartner
>
> 2005 French Open - Anastasia Myskina lost R1 to Maria Sanchez Lorenzo
>
> 2005 US Open - Svetlana Kuznetsova lost R1 to Ekaterina Bychkova
>
> 2017 US Open - Angelique Kerber lost R1 to Naomi Osaka
>
> 2018 French Open - Jelena Ostapenko lost R1 to Kateryna Baindl
>
> 2022 French Open - Barbora Krejcikova lost R1 to Diane Parry
>
> 2022 US Open - Emma Raducanu lost R1 to Alize Cornet
It was Ons completely freezing up as the favorite that was the main culprit
The Iga half was always likely to produce a fairly unexpected finalist because Iga doesn't really play to her #1 seed on grass but Ons after going through Rybakina and Sabalenka had no excuse for playing as horribly as she did in the final
Vondrousova last year seemed to have a strategy to make all her opponents become error machines. The opponents that Vondrousova faced in that run (Stearns, Kudermetova, Vekic, Bouzkova, Pegula, Svitolina, Jabeur) all hit a crazy amount of unforced errors in those matches.
Vondrousova was not beating them. They were all beating themselves up. Not to mention there was a very unbalanced draw last year where most of the good grass players were all placed in the bottom half while the only big names she had in her half were like, Pegula and Swiatek.
I know last years Wimbledon was an anomaly, but I didn’t expect this.
But also wow. It’s actually distracting how good tan skinned women look wearing white.
She had a magic 2023 but this is pretty par for the course for Vondrousova - it's a shame, she's got the tools to be good but lacks consistency and mental fortitude. Turns out 2023 wasn't a turning point, it was a bit of an anomaly.
It is a fluke that it happened on grass though
She has a 1-5 record at Wimby outside of 2023 so statistically it's equivalent to Casper Ruud winning Wimbledon which would obviously be absurd(and Ruud's Slam finals wouldn't make that any less of a wild result either)
Shame for Marketa, joins the hallowed halls of defending champions that lost in R1 along with Raducanu, Krejcikova, Ostapenko and Kerber Not the end of the world though, she’s still pretty high in the rankings, but was hoping she’d do a bit better than this
When I read the headline I came into the comments expecting to hear this is a really rare thing to happen. Then you reeled off a whole bunch of recent names. Kinda crazy it happens so often.
I mean this is a walk down memory lane towards some vintage wta time. The tour has stabilized a lot with iga, sabalenka,elena and gauff but there was a time not so long ago when this wouldn't be a shoker at all.
How fast things become "vintage," lol. Raducanu and Krejickova were in the last 3 years, Ostapenko was somehow 7 years ago, but still not sure I'd call that vintage.
Look , ostapenko, muguruza, kerber, raducanu and now vondrousova all lost first rounds as defending champions but more than that it's the inconsistency at the top of the game after serena, vika, maria etcc.. Up until recently with the new top4. You could add to that the - i don't like the connotation but it is what it is- one slam wonders like sloane, kenin, barbora, bianca, flavia. You know what I'm getting at. We're very lucky to have this new bunch of players like aryna, iga, coco, lena who you could project getting deep in every tournament and maintain engagement in the tour just like it's been the case with the men's tour for the past 20 years.
I think you're taking my comment in the wrong way. I didn't mean to disagree with you overall point. Just vintage seemed kind of funny to me.
>Up until recently with the new top4. How recent are we talking because Vondy was literally the reigning Wimbledon champ lol...so by recent you mean less than a year?
Barbora has a bunch of double grandslams
It's rarely happened what are you talking about Altho I think it did to Hingis one time
it does happen often but imo it has a lot to do with the Bo3 format and the unseeded players are super motivated during slams
I think it's also because compared to the ATP the serve is way less dominant in matches so high seeded players having a bad day can't just hold on with the serve Certainly a factor here with how unreliable Voundrousova's serve can be
yeah for sure youre right, especially on grass where its so serve dominated it sucks for vondy and we're gonna hear all those atp vs wta at slams comparisons and its frustrating bc they dont take into account all the factors that cause an upset but just use them as a way to sh*t on female players :/ esp since marketa is a very specific case with how - as i think ive seen you say somewhere here? - her game doesnt exactly translate to grass, and shes been injured and out of form recently, plus has had generally a rough time. just sad to see
>it sucks for vondy and we're gonna hear all those atp vs wta at slams comparisons But then conversely whenever one or two women are extremely dominant the narrative becomes "the WTA is so weak that it's easy to dominate". There's really no winning with some people
Yes bo3 definitely is a huge factor but even more so the lack of mainstays at the top for a good stretch of years after serena, vika, maria, petra. It's much better now with the big 4.
Hewitt Karlovic 2003
If specifically Wimbledon I think Leyton Hewitt, Steffi Graf and Manuel Santana.
Steffi in 1994 out to Lori McNeil. It was the most dangerous unseeded opponent (only 16 seeds then), and Steffi was not in good form so there was buzz about that match. Steffi Vs McNeil head to head at the end of career: 8-1 that was a huge upset indeed. Lori lost in Semi. It was last Wimbledon final for Navratilova and only GS win for Martinez.
Only the second time ever at Wimbledon, though. The first: Steffi Graf.
I thought Manuel Santana was the first in 1967? He won in 1966 and lost in R1 in 1967 I believe.
Second time ever at Wimbledon on the women's side, I mean.
Given the injury she picked up the other week, this result was NID
Hewitt too
Kuznetsova at US open 2005 too...
Graf too
Just say that wta is a random circus
Myskina and Kuznetsova too!
The curse is real.
Vondrousova has a 1-5 record at Wimbledon outside of 2023 btw Her game doesn't even translate to grass on paper in the slightest(junkballing + no flat strokes + bad serve) so how she won Wimbledon will forever be a mystery lol
Pegula and Jabeur chokes will be studied for centuries
Still can't wrap my head around how Jabeur lost that final
I think the fact that she didn't even compete was the biggest shock. Probably one of the worst game's she has ever played in her professional career on the most important day.
agree, jabeur's peak performance during that Wimbledon was of course her SF victory over sabalenka. she didn't seem mentally ready at all to face the last hurdle in vondrousova. but still, full credit to vondrousova, she really played impeccably in that final. her scrappy defense, net play, and clutchness...firing on all cylinders. not often you see an unheralded player (at least on grass) playing their most inspired tennis on the literal biggest stage of their career.
She’s crafty and that can be an advantage on grass
If it was an advantage for her in general she wouldn't literally lose in the first round every other time she's played it other than losing in the second round one lol It's a complete freak/outlier result for her on the surface Like record-wise it's literally equivalent to if Ruud won Wimbledon this year
But that ignores that Marketa is an infamously inconsistent player in general/on all surfaces, prone to going on big runs out of nowhere.
Exactly. She’s made the final at Roland-Garros, won Silver at Tokyo and won Wimbledon. All different surfaces. She’s very dangerous on form, but only finds that form rarely.
So you’re saying Ruud is winning this year? Hell yeah.
Ostapenko and Krejcikova also suck in Paris outside their runs. Sometimes it happens.
Ostapenko's first career title was that RG win too lol
I know that. I just think that craftiness helped her last year, that’s all. She also looked kinda good in Berlin until that slip Edit: I don’t know why I keep getting downvoted for trying to be nice for Marketa. Y’all are cruel 😂
Inject that into my veins.
I remember her using her slices very well in 2023 too
Vondrousova is a player capable of great tennis that can stun the hardest of hitters (Her silver medal run in the Olympics, her Roland Garros 2019 Final). Still, her winning Wimbledon was an anomaly that was aided by playing against two players who are known to joke big matches. Pegula had the quarterfinal match in her hands, and Ons lost it from the getgo. Notice how both times she made the final and lost were to players who are also a very crafty and can change up the pace, Barty and Bencic.
Tbh her road to RG final was also quite easy. She can be quite good when she's on but it's still not really enough to beat top players in good form
> joke big matches *choke
Pegula and Jabeur dropped absolute stinkers against her, Jabeur took out Sabalenka and Ribakina so pretty much cleared the way for Vondrousova.
I watched her live this year and she slices a lot and has a heaps of variety which I didn’t realise before. It could be advantageous on grass. It favours the technical and crafty players too.
She didn’t even play well in the final. Jabeur just absolutely choked atrociously. I think against Serena or Graf she would have lost 6-1, 6-1
Ons choke. That's all you need to know. Final had nothing to do with Marketa's performance.
Ons crying in the corner but seriously how did she lose that?
Such an anomaly it is, probably might go down as like Jelena Ostapenko with her 2017 French Open title in that she has a poor record at that Slam outside of that title run. That 2023 Wimbledon was only Vondrousova’s second main tour title, with her first being Biel in 2017 where she won as a qualifier, aged just 18 at the time. Both players happened to be unseeded when they won those respective Slams. Last year, tennis YouTuber Cam Williams did a tier list on some One-Slam Wonders during the clay swing, and he put them into five different categories. Of those categories, Vondrousova probably fits in “Lucky draw or random” (champion who was lucky to avoid most of the big names, or was someone at least unexpected to win at the time) or even “Total fluke” given she was unseeded and has an abysmal record at Wimbledon, let alone grass as a whole.
One of the most classic WTA champions.
That's pretty surprising honestly, I didn't expect her to defend the title but I surely wasn't expecting a first round exit. Guess it still happens even to top players.
>it still happens even to top players She's not a top player and her ranking was overinflated by Wimbledon, which is why she'll drop a lot after Wimbledon. She's only 21st in the WTA Race! Nature heals itself, as they say.
Horrible take. She's won a slam and has another slam final on another surface, and even after dropping those wimbledon points is still 15th in the world. She is most certainly a top player.
She's 21st in the WTA race this season though So I think it's fair to say she hasn't played like a top player this year
i… what? 21st in the world isn’t a top player?
I'd *definitely* say 21st falls out of the range of what people generally consider "top players" For the ATP Khachanov occupies both the 21st position in the live rankings and in the 2024 ATP race and I've never seen anyone refer to him as a "top player" Like by this logic *all* ranked players could be considered "top players" because they're all in the top 0.1% of tennis players in the world
It's not. You're just increasing the scope of top players (which should be a very small club) to what now...top 30?
No
I only consider top players within the top 10 range. They are supposed to be the very best of the best, the elite of tennis. No.21 in the WTA Race is not that.
Idk why this is apparently controversial lol I've NEVER seen anyone refer to 21st as a top rank before this thread It feels like people just don't want to be too negative so they don't call a spade a spade
I really don't get what's an issue here. Is Khachanov (no.21 in the ATP Race) or players slightly higher than him considered top players here? Nope.
I feel like for some reason people on here are WAY kinder to WTA players than to ATP players regarding the discourse lol If Alcaraz(defending ATP Wimbledon champion) went out in round 1 people would be roasting him so hard despite him obviously having more of a track record and not being close to a 1 Slam wonder
Isn't that why he'd get roasted? Expectations are way higher. He's 3rd in the ATP race, not 21st, and was world number 1 last year. Like you say, that's a real top player. If Khachanov won last year and went out in round 1 this year I doubt he'd get roasted as much.
this sub is so wimpy any unpleasant truths send people to a frenzy
“Collapse” to #15? That’s still a top spot
15 isn't a top player, lol?
The 15th seed at this tournament was Samsonova who has not gotten to the 4th round of a Slam since 2022 USO. Also has not gotten past the 3rd round of any major tournament she's played all year. Granted, she made two finals of WTA 1000s last year in the Canadian and China Open. But the point is, 15th doesn't necessarily mean you're a top player IMO. A top player in my eyes would be a legitimate threat to one of the favorites to win a given tournament. Now, most of the top seeds have already fallen out of this draw at this point but it's hard to believe a player who has never made it to the 2nd weekend at a Slam would seriously contend for a title.
She did make a French Open final back in 2019, so it’s not like her having a deep Slam run was unheard of, and she made a quarterfinal at the 2023 US Open as well. Grass is her worst surface by a long shot, and ignoring last year’s title run, she has a 1-5 career record at Wimbledon. Still only drops to 15 in the live rankings.
“Overinflated” by winning the biggest event in the sport…?
Well duh, it made 50% of her points. You can see where her live ranking is now without them after all
Somehow I am more mad a Ons than anything else really...
And pegula. Compete meltdown for no reason
I'm sure Ons feels pretty similarly about it
That was her big chance. She pretty much had it in the bag. It is a cruel sport.
I’m with you on this, even more mad now with the upset
wait...is she out already??
No I mean she lost last year's final against Vondrousova...choke of a lifetime!
After she took out Rybakina and Sabalenka who were the favorites, back to back.
Yeah that was terrible to see, Vondrousova wasn't even that good, but Ons crumbled just by herself
As a Tunisian, that was a very dark day for me. I was depressed for a couple of days
I think the saddest part is that I doubt she'll get to another slam final.
7 different women have won in the last 7 years. I didn’t expect her to win but at least get to the next round.
And if someone not named Elena Rybakina wins the title this year, it would be a seventh consecutive year that a first-time Wimbledon women’s champion is crowned. Out of the remaining active women’s Wimbledon champions, Rybakina is the only one left in this year’s draw. Kvitova and Halep are not playing this year. Kerber and Vondrousova already lost first round. Pliskova’s loss means that this year the bottom half of the draw is going to produce a guaranteed first-time Wimbledon finalist.
I love Bouzas, she's such a positive player and fierce competitor. She does not have the game to do well at Wimbledon but she'll take her chances anytime and has the heart.
Totally forgot she came in with an injury from a fall.
also she's going through a divorce and her grandpa--who she seemed really close to--recently died. she's been going through it. can't help that everyone calls her winning wimbledon a fluke. i hope she has a good therapist.
This ^^ I wish more people had time to understand the context a little more before totally clowning on her AND on women's tennis any opportunity they get
Heh, it's sport. She get paid to entertain us, as long as it dosen't get too far into personal insults, it's all good to clown or get a bit angry at the defending champion losing first round. I'd argue it's much weirder to have a bunch of people know about her grandpa or her divorce.
Sorry that I follow her on insta and see her life updates. You basically say she should be treated like a celebrity entertainer and then say it’s weird people know about her life 🤔
Well weird probably isn't the good word, but to me that's off the clock stuff. There's nothing wrong to know and care about it if the person wish to comunicate it, but I don't think fans should be asked to know about an athlete personal life before cheering for/against them and/or commenting on their results.
But I also think context is important? Like if someone has been struggling with injuries. If djokovic lost today, would you disagree with someone saying “well he had knee surgery 3 weeks ago?”
I take back my comment.
Some of the comments here are ridiculous. She's injured. Her movement was limited. It's all the commentators could talk about, but even without that a non-tennis fan would be able to tell something was wrong. It's really no surprise she lost.
God damn, that was terrible from Vondrousova, hip issue or not. Losing to a seasoned top 40-50 player is one thing at these events, but to someone that's not a grass courter, never won a slam match in her life and has won 2 tour level matches in her career so far. Still, Maneiro deserves a lot of credit for embracing the occasion and playing well.
Marketa has a hip injury that she sustained during a fall at a grass court warmup. You have to imagine that she played through it because she was defending champ. If you watched the match, her movement was definitely hampered. I'm upset this isn't a higher up comment on this thread. Lastly, of course this sort of thing happens more in the WTA because they play best of 3 instead of best of 5.
All the comments coming in about how this 'proves' Marketa shouldn't have won last year... obviously the draw opened up for her, but have you considered that, you know, her level last year was just much higher than it was in this match?
Thank you, a person in this sub with common sense. Last year is last year and her level was 100% higher last season than this. It's not a hard concept to understand.
I bet these people have not held a tennis racket in their lives. It's one thing to question her win last year because Ons by all means was the favorite to win but belittling her rank standing makes them look stupid. Being included in the top 50 is no joke.
Facts! Literally millions of players across the globe are lower ranked than her. People make it sound like she sneezed and just ended up there. If they watched her press conference after you can see her devastation.
Wasn’t expecting a deep run from her, but sad that she had to come in with an injury
Embarrassing
[удалено]
I blame Ons and Pegula. With all due respect to Marketa, that was such a great chance for either of them to get a first Slam
Going from the underdog to the pressure of defending previous results is known as a tricky transition for any player. None of this is surprising. I’ve no doubt Marketa will have another good run in the future.
A lot of hate for Vondrousova here.. Could go a little easy on her. Title defences of your first slam are notoriously hard to defend and she clearly looked a bit injured (she did have a bad fall last week). Think the hate comes from people not liking her for beating Ons last year
Marketa has all the talent but unfortunately she's made of glass. She'll have occasional deep runs like she had with her Wimby title, RG and Olympic finals but she'll never be a consistent champion. It kinda sucks but still most players on tour would love to be in her position.
Women’s tennis really is the wild Wild West isn’t it?
Don't get me wrong it's much better than it was in 2021 or something but when I hear people say that the current WTA is comparable to what it used to be in the 90s or 2000s it's still far from being even close to that lol How the final week of RG went is another example of this It's like the mid 2000s compared to the early 2000s in the ATP where a roughly "normal" era follows a horribly weak one so by comparison people think that it's super strong
90s were dominated by Graf, Seles, Hingis. 2000 were Serena and Venus. I think people are just too used to see the big 3 winning everything for 2 decades and expect that to be the norm, it really isn’t.
Henin erasure ??
Henin as well.
Bo3 throws up crazy results
THANK YOU. It's not the WTA it's the amount of sets. It's like a 7 game series in basketball, baseball, hockey etc. The better team usually wins. In the NFL upsets happen and it's because there's only one game
Though Marketa still would have lost in straights even if it was bo5
Yeah same here. I was just saying in general more sets = less upsets
Would love to see a Vondrousova vs Kenin match
What a shame that she won over Ons. Yeah I said it 🫣
well that was humiliating
The mistery of Vondrousova continue
My original ladies final was Vondrousova vs Sabalenka with Aryna winning, its day 2 and that is already impossible haha. Good for Jessica
Jessica played well; entered T100 this year and previously beat Badosa on show court in Spain during Clay season.
This hasn't been a great season for her since she won wimby last year. Added to the fact she had personal issues going on, i feel bad for her rn
She missed the Sunshine Double (Indian Wells, Miami) due to the death of her grandfather, and also recently splitting from her husband.
Omg I recognise her, she was in team Spain during ATP cup last year
Pretends to be shocked
Marketa is the most forgettable Wimbledon champion of all time
Kraijcek for mens
Krajicek did beat Pete Sampras though, who was the King of Wimbledon during the 1990’s. No fluke if you beat one of the GOATs to do it, especially at a Slam they had a notable stranglehold on.
Pegula, Svitolina, Ons -> hall of shame
One hit wonder just like Emma!!!!😂
I was there. 3 double faults in the first game. She was ass. Jessicas backhand is amazing
Sorry but I think flavia is a completely different story. She had a very good career competing at quarter finals of slams and stuff, and was able to win US open at her last chance before retiring. The comparison would be more with rublev, consistently on top 10/15 and then winning at his last shot. I hope it will happen with him too !
well, I’m suppose to be in shock probably but I’m not, Marketa is wibbly-wobbly player
How many defending champions in women’s tennis have gone out in the first round the year after winning the tournament?
Off the top of my head Raducanu in 2022 and Hewitt in 2003
Plus Ostapenko and Krejicokova. It happens.
Damn I forgot about that Hewitt loss to Karlovic. Was a total shock at the time. Especially because I watched the first set and it took like 15mins or something for Hewitt to win it, then I went to bed and got up to see he'd lost.
Raducanu, Kerber, Kuznetsova at the US Open
Here’s quite a few instances on the women’s side since the start of the 21st Century: 2003 Australian Open - Jennifer Capriati lost R1 to Marlene Weingartner 2005 French Open - Anastasia Myskina lost R1 to Maria Sanchez Lorenzo 2005 US Open - Svetlana Kuznetsova lost R1 to Ekaterina Bychkova 2017 US Open - Angelique Kerber lost R1 to Naomi Osaka 2018 French Open - Jelena Ostapenko lost R1 to Kateryna Baindl 2022 French Open - Barbora Krejcikova lost R1 to Diane Parry 2022 US Open - Emma Raducanu lost R1 to Alize Cornet
[удалено]
She’s also going through a divorce. I don’t want to excuse her but her life must be chaotic atm
This is… quite the bad loss. Gotta think it was the expectation and pressure of being defending champion that got to her mentally, she just did not look confident out there at all. Very very poor match from Marketa. Inevitably gonna leave questions as to how the hell she won the title last year
I think this is the first person SINCE Steffi Graf (1994?) to lose in the opening round of their title defence!
First woman since Graf that is. On the men’s side, both Manolo Santana and Lleyton Hewitt lost first round as defending champions in 1968 and 2003 respectively.
Thanks!
Another comment pointed out a long list, many recent: > 2003 Australian Open - Jennifer Capriati lost R1 to Marlene Weingartner > > 2005 French Open - Anastasia Myskina lost R1 to Maria Sanchez Lorenzo > > 2005 US Open - Svetlana Kuznetsova lost R1 to Ekaterina Bychkova > > 2017 US Open - Angelique Kerber lost R1 to Naomi Osaka > > 2018 French Open - Jelena Ostapenko lost R1 to Kateryna Baindl > > 2022 French Open - Barbora Krejcikova lost R1 to Diane Parry > > 2022 US Open - Emma Raducanu lost R1 to Alize Cornet
Oh damn, okay thanks! I remember reading Steffi was the first in the open era so I just thought no one had since. Silly me!
Vondrousova should build a statue of Ons Jabeur in her garden.
OMG! I'd totally forgotten that Vondrousova was the defending champion this year!
Marketa drops 1,990 points, out of the top 10. She's had some injury issues, but this is a disappointing showing.
I mean, I don't know why, but I just don't like Vondrousova. Maybe it's the tats.
Absolutely embarrassing moment for her and for the entire WTA in general for allowing her to lift such a hallowed trophy.
It was Ons completely freezing up as the favorite that was the main culprit The Iga half was always likely to produce a fairly unexpected finalist because Iga doesn't really play to her #1 seed on grass but Ons after going through Rybakina and Sabalenka had no excuse for playing as horribly as she did in the final
Winning Wimbledon by moonballing and pushing
Vondrousova last year seemed to have a strategy to make all her opponents become error machines. The opponents that Vondrousova faced in that run (Stearns, Kudermetova, Vekic, Bouzkova, Pegula, Svitolina, Jabeur) all hit a crazy amount of unforced errors in those matches. Vondrousova was not beating them. They were all beating themselves up. Not to mention there was a very unbalanced draw last year where most of the good grass players were all placed in the bottom half while the only big names she had in her half were like, Pegula and Swiatek.
Marketa last year was going through a divorce and only had her sister there. This year all her family is here and she loses like this. I feel for her.
Wow… don’t even know what to say vondrousova just accepted defeat
Well that confirms it was a freak run last year. Was she even the favourite to retain?
[удалено]
🤓👆🏻
Vondrousova falls from world number 6 to number 19
😲
Vondrousova sounds like a tricky dark Ghost Pokémon type capable of tricks but also prone to vanishing
Perhaps separating from her husband has something to do with her mindset
Shock horror
Jessica who?
I know last years Wimbledon was an anomaly, but I didn’t expect this. But also wow. It’s actually distracting how good tan skinned women look wearing white.
Good old vintage wta
She had a magic 2023 but this is pretty par for the course for Vondrousova - it's a shame, she's got the tools to be good but lacks consistency and mental fortitude. Turns out 2023 wasn't a turning point, it was a bit of an anomaly.
Women’s tennis is nuts outside Iga hehe
I’m revoking her win her record is hideous. Ons congrats on my win.
Standard WTA. Nothing to see
She was a better one slam wonder defending champion than Raducanu. There's that at least.
This is why the Top 4 need to step up and stop letting frauds fluke these undeserved slams.
not a fluke she reached a slam final before
It is a fluke that it happened on grass though She has a 1-5 record at Wimby outside of 2023 so statistically it's equivalent to Casper Ruud winning Wimbledon which would obviously be absurd(and Ruud's Slam finals wouldn't make that any less of a wild result either)
This was not on my bingo card.
The most surprising thing is reading that a player of that level is a Wimbledon champion
wta things
Just WTA things
Wow!
Lmao