TENNIS TUESDAY: France Wins Fed Cup Merci A Kiki; Zverev, Thiem and Tsistipas Get Surprising Wins at #ATPFinals

KIKI STEALS THE SHOW AS FRANCE WINS FED CUP IN PERTH

Much to the surprise of many observers, France defeated Australia in the Davis Cup Final held in Perth, Australia last weekend. After the first two matches were 6-1 6-1 France (Kiki Mladenovic d. Ajla Tomljanovic) and 6-0 6-0 Australia (Ash Barty d. Caroline Garcia), most people expected the World #1 to lead her team to their first Fed Cup in 45 years. But after leading 6-2 against Mladenovic Barty's game went off and eventually she lost in a 3rd set tie-break. Amazingly, Tomljanovic was able to win her match to even the tie at 2-all but then Garcia and Mladenovic teamed up to win the decisive doubles tie against Barty and Samantha Stosur and victory for France.

SOME SURPRISING RESULTS AT THE 2019 ATP YEAR END CHAMPIONSHIPS

The ATP Year-End Championship is happening now in London. Currently called the Nitto ATP Finals, it will be moving to Turin, Italy in 2020. Although it started off slowly, there have been some surprising results. Dominic Thiem has defeated Roger Federer for the third time this year. He followed up that win with a 3rd set tiebreak victory over Novak Djokovic which many people are calling the best 3-set men's match of the year. However, in the even more surprising results section is the fact that both Alexander Zverev and Stefans Tsitsipas defeated players whom they had 0-5 head-to-head records against in straight sets. Zverev defeated World #1 Rafael Nadal and Tsitsipas defeated Daniil Medvedev.

2019 WTA YEC: Barty Defeats Svitolina To Win Biggest Paycheck in Tennis

Ash Barty this weekend won the biggest paycheck in women's tennis history when she won US$4.42 million for winning the Shiseido WTA Finals Shenzhen by defeating 2018 WTA Finals champion Elina Svitolina. Barty has had an amazing 2019 tennis season (which technically is over because she is playing in the 2019 Fed Cup final next weekend against France in Perth, Australia). In 2019, after never being ranked higher than #15 in the World or reaching a major semifinal, she won the 2019 Roland Garros title and ascended to World #1, eventually earning the end-of-year #1 ranking for 2019.

At the WTA Finals (which she qualified for the first time this year, becoming one of the very few players to win it in their debut) she was able to come from behind against World #2 Karolina Pliskova in the semifinals to win 4-6 6-2 6-3 (as I predicted). Svitolina  had a  lot more trouble with Belinda Bencic than I expected, with the Swiss player becoming the 4th(!) to withdraw from the tournament, following the heels of Naomi Osaka, Bianca Andreescu and  Kiki Bertens. Bencic won the first set 7-5 against Svitolina but then had an injury in the second set, lost that 6-3 and finally withdrew from the match and tournament trailing 1-4 in the third.

I suspect Barty's year will come to a perfect end when she powers Australia past France in the Fed Cup.

TENNIS TUESDAY: Nole,Rafa Suffer Shock Clay Defeats; Fognini Wins Monte Carlo Masters; Fed Cup Final Is FRA v AUS;

FOGNINI WINS FIRST MASTERS SERIES SHIELD IN MONTE CARLO
Amazingly, the flamboyant and talented Fabio Fognini, 31,  won his first ATP Masters series event in Monte Carlo by following up his stunning defeat of Rafael Nadal with a relatively tight 6-3 6-4 win over Dusan Lajovic who beat the person who took out Djokovic the round before. Lajovic became the lowest seeded player in Monte Carlo in 18 years while Fognini became the first Italian player to win the Monte Carlo tournament in 50 years, and only the fourth player to win the tournament in the last 15 years since Nadal has won it 11 times, Djokovic twice, and Stan Wawrinka once (2014). It was  aoyhood dream for Fognini, who was born a short 40-minute drive away in San Remo, just over the border in Italy and often visited the famous tennis club as a youngster.

DJOKOVIC AND NADAL SUFFER SHOCK CLAY COURT LOSSES
In Monte Carlo, the two best players in the world, #1 Novak Djokovic and #2 Rafael Nadal both suffered shock upsets to start  their clay court season. Djokovic lost to Daniil Medvedev in the Monte Carlo quarterfinals in a tough 3-set match, while Nadal lost what he called "his worst clay court match in 14 years" to Fabio Fognini in the semifinals 6-4 6-2. Nadal was down 5-0 in the second set with Fognini serving for a bagel set before staging a mini-comeback that was ultimately unsuccessful.

FED CUP SEMIFINALS: FRA DEFEATS ROU 3-2, AUS DEFEATS BLR 3-2
Two exciting Fed Cup semifinals were played this weekend, with France utlasting Romania despite some heroics from Simona Halep to win 3-2 and Ash Barty continuing to drag her squad over the finish line, this time, against Belarus. In November France will face Australia down under!

TENNIS TUESDAY: Osaka Splits From Sascha, Fed Cup Semis Set, Serena Back to WTA Top10

NAOMI OSAKA ANNOUNCES SPLIT FROM COACH SASCHA BAJIN
Wow! World #1 Naomi Osaka has announced she has ended her coaching relationship with Sascha Bajin, who was with her as she raced up the rankings from #72 a year ago to winning the 2018 US Open and 2019 Australian Open and become the #1 ranked player in the world.  Bajin was a longtime member of Serena Williams's support staff and was named WTA Coach of the Year in 2018. This is the fourth example of a Grand Slam winner dropping a coach within a short time afterwards: Angelique Kerber split with Wim Fisette after winning 2018 Wimbledon, Simona Halep split with Darren Cahill after winning the 2018 French Open and Sloane Stephens split with Kamau Murray after winning the 2017 US Open.

FED CUP SEMIFINALS SET UP: ROMANIA V. FRANCE, AUSTRALIA V.  BELARUS
In a surprising result, Romania beat defending champs Czech Republic and Australia beat the  United States (playing without any major champions), Belarus beat Germany (without Kerber) and France beat Belgium. The Fed Cup semifinals will be played in April. Ash Barty won all 3 ties for Australia. Halep had a key win over Pliskova in the #CZEROU matchup.

SERENA WILLIAMS WILL RETURN TO TOP 10 NEXT WEEK
Amazingly, even though she has only played in 7(!) tournaments in the last year, reaching 2 major finals (2018 Wimbledon and 2018 US Open), Serena Williams will be rejoining the WTA Top 10.

TSONGA ENDS TITLE DROUGHT AT OPEN SUD DE FRANCE
Jo-Wilfried Tsonga won his 17th career title (his first title in more than a year). He defeated Pierre-Hugues Herbert in the final of the Open Sud de France 6-4 6-2.

TENNIS TUESDAY: Rafa Breaks More Records; Fed Cup Final Set; Babies Everywhere

NADAL WINS RECORD 11TH MONTE CARLO MASTERS ; 31ST MASTERS OVERALL
The King of Clay, Rafael Nadal won his 11th Monte Carlo Masters title (in 14 years) by defeating Kei Nishikori 6-3 6-2. Nadal won the title without dropping  a set and basially terrorized the rest of the men's field with his 6-0 6-2 drubbing of the "Prince of Clay" Dominic Thiem in the quarterfinals.
Nadal was able to retain his hold on the World #1 ranking by defending his title as World #2 Roger Federer is again sipping the clay court season to improve his chances at winning another Wimbledon title. Nadal nw has 31 ATP Masters shields, 1 ahead of the 30 Novak jokovic has and well ahead of Federer's 27, with two more clay court Masters tournaments to be played this year: Madrid and Rome.

FED CUP FINAL SET: UNITED STATES WILL FACE CZECHIA
The Fed Cup semifinals were last weekend and the United States defeated France 3-2 behind solid wins by Sloane Stephens and Madison Keys while the Czech Republic dominated Germany 4-1 with Petra Kvitova and Karolina Pliskova each eating Angie Kerber and Julia Goerges. The Czech Republic has been in the Fed Cup final.

BABIES, BABIES, BABIES! SPRING IS HERE AND EVERYBODY'S PREGNANT
John Isner announced that his wife Madison McKinley is expecting their first child. Also, Sania Mirza announced on instagram that she was pregnant, and noted tennis umpire Eve Asderaki answered Dasha Kasatkina's question "boy or girl?" while umpiring a Fed Cup match this weekend with "boy."

TENNIS TUESDAY: U.S. Win 2017 Fed Cup, Nadal Ends Season, ATP YEC Under Way

U.S.A. WIN 2017 FED CUP, ENDING 17-YEAR DROUGHT BY WINNING CLIFFHANGER OVER BELARUS
The 2017 Federation Cup final was played last weekend and the United States won the tie 3-2 to win their first Fed Cup since 2000. The match was surprisingly close despite the fact that the United States had 2 Top 15 players in 2017 US Open champion Sloane Stephens and CoCo Vandeweghe while Belarus had one player in the Top 100. Stephens' winless streak since winning her major title continues and she lost both matches she played last weekend. The true star of the team was Vandeweghe who won both of her singles match and then paired with Shelby Rogers to win the final tie, which was the doubles match.

ATP YEAR-END CHAMPIONSHIP PROCEEDS WITH WINS BY FEDERER, ZVEREV, SOCK, DIMITROV AND GOFFIN.
The year-end ATP tour championship has begun and there have been some surprises. Roger Federer has qualified for the semifinal round by defeating Jack Sock and Sascha Zverev. Other players who have won matches in the round-robin stage are Sock, Zverev, Grigor Dimitrov and David Goffin. On Thursday, Sock and Zverev will face off for the remaining semifinal spot. In the other half of the draw, Dimitrov and Goffin will face off for another semifinal berth.

NADAL ENDS SEASON AFTER LOSS TO GOFFIN AT YEC
Rafael Nadal withdrew from the ATP Finals after losing a 3-set match to David Goffin, ending his 2017 season. He has never done well at the year-end championships despite qualifying 13 times, he has withdrawn 5 different times and lost in the final twice. He ends 2017 as the #1 player, with a record of 67W-10L.

TENNIS TUESDAY: ATP YEC HALFWAY OVER, CZECH WIN FED CUP

ATP WORLD TOUR FINALS HALF OVER: Murray, Djokovic, Raonic, Thiem, Nishikori All Notch Victories
The year-end championships of the ATP tour are underway in London with the 8 players who had the best results in 2016. Novak Djokovic has won this tournament the last four consecutive years and needs to do so again in order to end the year ranked #1. Andy Murray, Kei Nishikori, Marin Cilic and Stan Wawrinka are in one round-robin group (named after JohnMcEnroe). The other round-robin group, which is named after Murray's coach Ivan Lendl, contains Djokovic, Milos Raonic, Dominic Thiem and Gael Monfils. Halfway through the tournament, everyone except Monfils, Cilic and Wawrinka have won at least one match.

Czech Republic Captures Fed Cup After Bravura Performance From Strycova
As I mentioned on Sunday, Babrora Strycova demonstrated her nerves of steel for the second consecutive year, coming up victorious in the fifth doubles rubber to power the Czech team for its 3rd consecutive Fed Cup and fifth title in 6 years. (In 2013 Italy beat Russia 4-0 to win the title.)

Andy Murray Relishes His 2nd Week As World #1, Trying To Win 9th Title in 2016
Andy Murray became World #1 last Monday after he reached the finals of the Paris Masters tournament. Murray eventually won his 8th title of the year by defeating John Isner in the final.

2016 Fed Cup: Czech Wins 3rd Year In A Row; 5 of last 6

For the third year in a row the Czech Republic won the Federation Cup, the annual country-based tennis competition on the women's tour. Just like last year, the title came down to the fifth tie, the doubles match, and again Barbora Strycova was the Most Valuable Player, in providing the third point for her team and country.

This year, Czech faced France, and although Caroline Garcia was able to upset 2-time major champion Petra Kvitova and 2016 US Open finalist Karolina Pliskova she was unable to win the doubles tie with her partner Kiki Mladenovic when Pliskova teamed with Strycova.

Czech Republic has now won the Fed Cup title every year except 2013 since 2011.

TENNIS TUESDAY: Kerber Soars To #2; Venus Returns To Indian Wells; Federer Has Knee Surgery

KERBER SOARS TO #2 FOLLOWING 2016 AUSSIE OPEN TITLE
After winning her first major title by surprisingly defeating Serena Williams in 3 tight sets in the 2016 Australian Open women's final on Saturday January 27th, the #7 seed jumped to World #2 in the rankings. The German player became the first woman from her country since Steffi Graf to win a major title, and the first to reach so high in the rankings. Her win also denied Serna her chance to match Graf's career major title haul of 22.

VENUS WILLIAMS ANNOUNCES RETURN TO INDIAN WELLS!
One year after her sister Serena returned to the second largest tennis tournament in America, the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, CA, Venus Williams has announced that she will also be ending her unofficial boycott of the tournament. The two had last played the tournament in 2003 when they were scheduled to play each other in a semifinal and Venus withdrew a mere 30-minutes before the scheduled start time and the crowd got ugly (and racist). Anyway, Serena went on to win the tournament but the two vowed to never play their again. Since the William Sisters are from Southern California it has always been troubling for many that they have been a no-show at the tournament that is closest to their hometown. Anyway, that is over, because both Williams Sisters will be in the draw for the 2016 edition of the tournament. I expect I will be attending!

FEDERER INJURES KNEE HANGING OUT WITH HIS KIDS, WILL MISS 2 TOURNEYS
Roger Federer has undergone knee surgery to repair a torn meniscus he suffered the day after his devastating loss to Novak Djokovic in the 2016 Australian Open men's semifinals. He will miss the indoor hard court tournament in Rotterdam and the Dubai Duty Free Open (where he beat Djokovic to win his 84th major ATP title) but he will play Indian Wells.

CZECH FED CUP HERO IS KAROLINA PLISKOVA!? SEMIFINALS SET
The Fed Cup quarterfinals were played this weekend and Karolina Pliskova of the Czech Republic kept the defending champs hopes alive with a gutsy doubles win with Barbara Strycova after also winning both of her singles matches against Romanians Simona Halep and Monica Niculescu. The semifinals are now set, with Czech Republic playing Switzerland and France playing the Netherlands. Switzerland took out Germany in a tough 3-2 match where Belinda Bencic was responsible for all 3 points, including defeating Kerber in straight sets. France took out Italy 4-1 and the Netherlands surprisingly dismissed Russia 3-1.

TENNIS TUESDAY: Czechs Triumph, Federer Ends Djokovic's Streak!

CZECH REPUBLIC WINS FOURTH FED CUP IN FIVE YEARS DESPITE SHARAPOVA'S 2-0 PRESENCE
The Czech Republic was able to win a dramatic 3-2 tie versus Russia with the help of Karolina Pliskova this weekend despite the presence of Maria Sharapova playing for Russia and her defeats of Pliskova and Petra Kvitova. This was the fourth win in five years (2011, 2012, 2014 and 2015) for the Czech Republic.

FEDERER GETS REVENGE AGAINST DJOKOVIC IN LONDON, ENDING WORLD #1'S 23-MATCH WINNING STREAK
Roger Federer ended Novak Djokovic's 23-match winning streak in fine style at the ATP Tour Finals by winning in straight sets, 7-5 6-2. Federer's win gives the him the 22-21 edge in their head-to-head and assures that he will be playing in the semifinal round on Saturday. Almost certainly, the two will be facing again in the championship match, unless the two players who advance from the other group (likely to be Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray) disrupt this narrative. Interestingly, Federer was also the last person to beat Djokovic before the win streak began (in the 2015 Cincinati Masters final in August).

TENNIS TUESDAY: Fed Cup Final Set; Djokovic Amasses Huge Lead For #1

Fed Cup Final Set Between Czech Republic and Russia
Czech Republic with Petra Kvitova was able to easily dismiss France while Russia was able to get past Germany despite the absence of World #2 Maria Sharapova by winning the doubles rubber. The Fed Cup final will be held between Russia and Czech Republic in November in Russia. This will be the fourth year in the last five the Czech team has been in the final (they lost in the semifinals in 2013 to Italy).

United States Fails To Make World Group Despite Serena Playing 3 Matches
Serena Williams made a rare appearance in Fed Cup this weekend against Italy on clay and despite winning both her single matches (against Sara Errani and Camila Giorgi) the USA failed to secure a victory. Serena teamed up with Ali Riske in the deciding doubles rubber but the Americans could not withstand the pressure from Flavia Pennetta and Errani and lost the tie 2-3. Venus Williams and Madison Keys did not participate in the tie for unspecified reasons.

Djokovic On 17-Match Winning Streak
World #1 Novak Djokovic is on a 17-match winning streak (35-2 for 2015) which has provided him with three consecutive ATP Masters series titles: Indian Wells, Miami and Monte Carlo. This is the first time anyone has won the first three Masters tournaments of the year and this result has the Serbian with a staggering lead over World #2 Roger Federer.

TENNIS TUESDAY: Czechs Win Fed Cup; Serena-Woz Friendship, Federer Still In Hunt For 2014 #1 Rank

Czech Win Fed Cup (Again)
The Czech Republic dominated Germany to win the 2014 Fed Cup title; it is the country's 3rd win in four years (2014, 2012 and 2011). Anchored by 2-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova, the 2014 Wimbledon champion scored wins over Angelique Kerber and Andrea Petkovic. Combined with Lucie Safarova's win over Kerber, this gave the Czech team a unassailable lead over Germany.

Serena-Wozniacki Friendship Puzzles Observers

Despite playing against each other in two recent high profile matches (2014 US Open final and the Year-End Championships semifinals) World #1 Serena Williams and former World #1 Caroline Wozniacki continue to be best friends and unafraid of showing the world they can be friendly off the court and fierce competitors off it.

Federer Likely To Reach Year End Championships Semifinals, Year End #1 (Theoretically) Possible

Roger Federer has won his first two matches at the ATP World Tour Finals in London by defeating Milos Raonic and Kei Nishikori in straight sets. However since Nishikori and Murray have both won and lost one match each, it is theoretically possible that if Federer loses against Murray and Nishikori beats Raonic that they could qualify. But all Federer has to do is win a set against Murray and he will definitely qualify. Since Nishikori beat Murray it would be more likely that Nishikori could qualify before Murray along with Federer. If Raonic beats Nishikori then Federer and Murray will automatically qualify regardless of the result of their match. Federr could end the year #1 if he wins the Year--End Championships by remaining undefeated *and* wins multiple live rubbers in the Davis Cup final the following week.