Another tennis week ended in February. The women played a major tournament in Doha, which is in the WTA 500 category this season. The men held three simultaneous tournaments: the ATP 500 in Rotterdam and the ATP 250 in Delray Beach and Buenos Aires.

WTA 500 Doha

The Qatar Total Open 2023 competition, held for the first time this year, reminded women that we have real dominance on the tour. Polish Iga Swiatek, who did not start the season very well, focused entirely on his game and it did not take long for the result to come. In Doha, she started the second round with a devastating victory over Australian Open 2022 finalist Danielle Collins, giving her opponent just one game. Before the quarter-final match with Iga, Abu Dhabi champion Belinda Bencic withdrew from the tournament, and in the semi-finals, Sviontek lost Veronika Kudermetova, again, out of the classification.

And only in the championship match, the opponent was able to hold out for more than an hour. Jessica Pegula managed to get up to 3 matches and that was the end of her fight. Although the American should not lose heart, he will enter the top 3 in the world rankings on Monday. On the other hand, Swiatek equalized the WTA Open Era record for the fewest games played on the way to the championship. In 1985, legendary American Chris Evert won the competition in Tokyo, losing just 5 matches. But then he only played two matches.

Iga also mentioned Ukraine in his victory speech. Polka continues to play with a blue and yellow ribbon on his favorite hat, so he can’t help but rejoice in the victories.

Ukrainians in Doha have performed with varying degrees of success. Lyudmila Kichenok did her best in doubles at the Qatari courts, where she again teamed up with Latvian Alena Ostapenko to show that the duo can still produce results. Kichenok and Ostapenko won all three games as favourites, losing only to top-ranked Americans Corey Gauff and Jessica Pegula in the final. Unfortunately, there were some unforced errors in the ending, which is usually penalized at this level. But there is the first finale of the new season.

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Broadcast from Lyudmyla Kichenok (@lyuda_kichenok)

The achievements of Ukrainian women in singles were much more modest. Katarina Zawatskaya lost to strong Canadian Rebecca Marino in the first qualifying round, despite leading the second game to zero. Our first racquet, Angelina Kalinina, also stopped at this stage, losing to American Lauren Davis, who won this season’s Hobart championship. Dayana Yastremskaya defeated US Claire Liu for the second time this season, but lost to US Open 2021 finalist Leila Fernandez in the semi-finals of qualifying. That’s all the adventures of Ukrainian women in solitary confinement.

It is also worth noting that Estonian Anett Kontaveit announced that she will miss the tournaments in Doha and Dubai due to a back injury. She was the 7th racket in the world on February 21st last year, and now she’s already 27th. Australian Open 2020 champion Sofia Kenin unexpectedly reminded herself that she had beaten Lyudmila Samsonova in the first round of Doha, winning her first win against a representative of the top 20 in 2.5 years.

ATP 500 Rotterdam

In the men’s tournaments again there were no Ukrainians, but already in the next weekly review, this point will change for the better. So far, we can say that the ATP will not drive Russian tennis players away, and they have achieved sports victories, which were later used for Russian propaganda. However, there is nothing new, but still there is nothing pleasant about it.

It is worth mentioning the Italian Yannick Sinner, who played in the finals two weeks in a row. He beat Maxime Cressy in the championship game in Montpellier last week and took the first set with Medvedev in Rotterdam but lost in the end. On the way to the final, Yannick beat the top 3 players for the first time – it was Stefanos Tsitsipas. Meanwhile, the Greek could debut as the world’s second racket if they win in Rotterdam, and Alcaraz did not become champions in Buenos Aires. But this time the stars lighted the way for someone else.

ATP 250 Buenos Aires / ATP 250 Delray Beach

On dirt ground in Argentina, it was interesting that former world leader Carlos Alcaras was back on tour. The Spanish player was not successful at first, but Carlitos gained momentum in each match. In the final, the Spaniard fought Briton Cameron Norrie, who prefers faster surfaces but also has a title on the pitch. Still, Alcaraz is expected to take the seventh title in his career.

At Delray Beach, American Taylor Fritz was the best, beating all her rivals as the seeded leader and the world’s seventh racket. In the final he was stronger than the Serbian Miomir Ketsmanovich.

Another Manafov award

Ukrainian tennis player Vladislav Manafov played seriously for the national team after playing against Lebanon and won another doubles title in Challenger. This time, together with Ivan Lutarevich, he became the best of the French Cherbourg. So far, Vladislav has only questions when choosing a wife.

Also at the level of the challengers, Alexander Brainin’s first entry into the main team should be noted. He won two qualifiers at the competitions in Bahrain and battled the well-known Norwegian Viktor Durasovich to the Ukrainian fans in the first round of the base.

In the same tournament, Vitaliy Sachko defeated Russian Andrey Chepelev in the qualifying final and went to the qualifying stage, but could not continue the tournament due to a sprained leg.

ITF Tournaments

Daria Snigur got off to a good start at the 60,000th ITF in Germany, but 19-year-old German Noma Akuge Noha’s quarter-final hurdle proved insurmountable. This season, Dasha is still far from great victories at this level, there is no point in talking about rising.

off-site

Lyudmila Kichenok, Katarina Zavatskaya and our Belgian Marina Zanevskaya went to a gala party together in Doha.

Dayana Yastremskaya brightly celebrated the birthday of her mother, who often accompanied her at tournaments. Marina Yastremskaya posed on her daughter’s Instagram this year in a revealing outfit, showing that she is also friends with sports.

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Posted by Dayana Yastremska (@dayana_yastremskay)