The following article on Katarina Srebotnik is by Tomaz Mencinger of Tennis Thoughts. This post is part of On the Baseline Tennis News’ 2008 Players to Watch Series.
Katarina Srebotnik is probably one of the least known players in the top 30 on the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour.
Most people who do know something about Katarina have been following ladies and mixed doubles tournaments for the past few years.
Katarina was in three Grand Slam doubles finals this year and is currently ranked No. 26 in singles and No. 4 in doubles.
For those of us who have been following her career for a while the question remains: Can Katarina breakthrough at some point and get into the top 10 in singles or will her career and ranking slowly fade away?
Here are three reasons why Katarina Srebotnik can really make it big in 2008:
1. Katarina has been a winner since her junior career.
Katarina won junior Wimbledon in 1998 and was a runner up at the junior US Open in that same year.
When junior tennis players start to compete at an early age, they quickly find out where they belong – are they winners and always at the top or are they just one of the many who lose in the early rounds?
What a tennis player adopts as a belief in their early days will most likely stay with them throughout their career although they improve technically and tactically.
Katarina has been a winner, and she expects to be a winner.
2. Katarina is experienced enough to play the big matches.
Experience is one of those factors in tennis that you cannot teach. It takes time to become familiar with the Tour, to play well in big stadiums, and to play well against big names.
Katarina Srebotnik has been in the top 100 of the WTA Tour for the last six years and has played against many top women, including Lindsay Davenport, Svetlana Kuznetsova, Maria Sharapova and others.
She has also won three mixed doubles Grand Slam titles and sixteen ladies doubles titles.
These experiences can help Katarina play her best tennis when it matters most.
3. Katarina can play with the best.
Katarina won against big names in the past and has been very close to winning against other top ranked women tennis players.
At the 2006 Zurich Open she defeated Mary Pierce, Elena Dementieva, and Maria Kirilenko, and held a set point against Maria Sharapova before losing in the semifinals.
Other close matches with top players include losing 3-6, 6-3, 7-6(5) to Davenport, 4-6, 7-5, 7-5 to Dementieva, 6-7(4), 6-4, 7-6(4) to Kuznetsova, and 1-6, 6-3, 6-2 to Jelena Jankovic.
So what Katarina needs is to win one of those big matches against big names to finally start believing that she can make it into the top 10 in singles.
Srebotnik finished the year 2005 ranked No. 28 and 2006 ranked No. 23. She is currently ranked No. 26 and 2008 can be her year to break past No. 20 and eventually into the top 10.
She has the winner mentality, lots of experience, and can play with the best.
Tomaz Mencinger writes about Tennis Tips For Better Play at www.tennisthoughts.com.
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Hey, great post. I agree that Srebotnik has all the tools to do really well next year. I’d love to see her get to the second week of a slam, because once she gets there that winner mentality will serve her well. And she seems like a nice young woman so that’s always a plus.
Tomaz – Thanks for contributing to our series!
I had a chance to see firsthand much of Srebotnik’s three match battle against Davenport last year. She had a couple of big chances to shutdown Lindsay that day at the US Open, but for one reason or another, she failed to take the advantage.
I’ve only seen a little bit of her since then, so I’ve not had a chance to get another good look at her form. What is her best surface and which Grand Slam would be the most suited for her game?
Oh my! I love Katarina and I hate to be a wet blanket, but you have Got to be Kidding if you see the top ten as Srebotnik’s destination! In under 3 months she will be 27 years old. And with apologies, she is ranked #26 in singles for a reason. In 2007, she reached one final (and lost) — in a Tier III event. In 2006, she reached one final (and lost) — in a Tier IV event. But she is a top 5 doubles player! That is clearly where her focus is going to be in the coming years. Seriously, there are many exciting young players coming up who very likely will challenge for the top ten next year (Golovin, Vaidisova, Szavay) or the year after (Azarenka, Radwanska, Paszek). But lovely Katarina? Well, let’s keep it real around here ;>
I think Srebotnik could crack the top 20, but I don’t believe she’ll ever make it to the top 10. I remember reading an article about her where she stated she was very happy with her singles ranking and doesn’t really aspire to be the very best. I take that to mean she doesn’t really want to be top 10 and put in the corresponding work. She’s a very accomplished doubles player. That’s enough for her, which is great.