Headline Kostyuk, Alkaraz conquers London, Kvitova’s success, Kolb’s return

The penultimate week of tennis ended before one of the main tournaments of the year, Wimbledon, began. From June 19-25, two tournaments of the ATP 500 series were played, one WTA 500 and WTA 250. Ukrainian athletes also participated in high-level competitions, and Ukrainian fans even managed to celebrate a doubles cup. But first things first.

WTA 250 Birmingham

Among all 4 tournaments in the ATP or WTA series, the competition in Birmingham is the lowest (250 points for a win, the rest – 500). But the main interest of Ukrainian tennis fans was concentrated here, because 7 Ukrainians played simultaneously on the grass courts of Great Britain.

In the first qualifying round, there was a Ukrainian derby between Lesya Tsurenko and Dayana Yastremska. The game ended with a smashing two-game win for Dayana. Yastremskaya reached the final of the selection, losing in the fight to Teresa Martintsova.

Three Ukrainians started from the 1/16 finals: Elina Svitolina, Marta Kostyuk and Angelina Kalinina. Elina was unlucky initially losing to the promising Czech Linda Frugvirtova (2:6, 0:6). For Svitolina, this was the first game played on turf since 2021. For her, this is definitely not the most comfortable coverage. Meanwhile, Svitolina went to Wimbledon 2023 thanks to the organizers’ wild card.

Getty Images/Global Images Ukraine. Elina Svitolina

Marta Kostyuk met with her ex-girlfriend Anastasia Potapova in the first round. Everything went well until the 11th match of the 2nd match, the Ukrainian got the first set from the country representative 404. Then Potapova took a break, then applied to the match and took control of the fight. Kostyuk obviously burned and lost the 3rd set, completing his performances on the turf and preparing for Wimbledon.

Ukraine’s first racket, Angelina Kalinina, became the only Ukrainian to reach the 2nd round. At the beginning of the tournament, she won against the promising American Alisha Parks (although Alisha is already 22 years old). Then Kalinina met with Harriet Dart. Angelina and Harriet fought for the second time in a week and the Ukrainian again lost to the Great Britain representative. First there was a loss at Nottingham, again in the 1/8 final and now in Birmingham. It is worth noting that among all Ukrainian tennis players playing at the WTA level, Angelina is most prepared for the turf major. Angelina held 2 tournaments over 2 weeks and it starts in Eastbourne from Monday. Meanwhile, Kalinina’s “favorite” rival Dart will also play in Eastbourne, but will only face the Ukrainian in the semi-finals. Maybe we can see Angelina a little further in the 1/8 final…

In the singles the championship was won by Alena Ostapenko, who was placed under number 2. In the final, she defeated the first racket of the tournament, Barbora Kreychikova, in two sets. Interestingly, Alena made an incredible comeback in the 1/4 final. The Latvian lost 4:6, 0:4 (30:40) in the match against Magdalena Frenkh, but managed to return to the game and win the match.

Getty Images/Global Images Ukraine

3 Ukrainians played in pairs in Birmingham: Marta Kostyuk with Lyudmila and Nadezhda Kichenok. Together with Alicia Rosolskaya, Nadezhda lost to Magda Lynette / Bernard Pera, completing her performances in the first round.

Lyudmila Kichenok and Alena Ostapenko were seeded below the first number, while Marta Kostyuk and the world’s first racket Barbora Kreychikova remained below the second place. It would be nice to see the final duel with the participation of Lyudmila and Marta, everything even went to this, because both tandem with the Ukrainians reached the semifinals. Unfortunately, Kichenok and Ostapenko lost to Storm Hunter and Alisha Parks. Kostyuk and Kreichikova, respectively, reached the final of the tournament, where they defeated the criminal Lyudmila and Alena in two matches.

Ukraine and Czech became the champions of the tournament in Birmingham. For Marta, this is her 2nd doubles trophy in her career, and 17th for Barbora. Both Kostyuk and Kreychikova got into an interesting degree, where there were only 3 girls. Marta became the third tennis player to win at least one singles tournament and one doubles tournament in 2023. Barbora has a total of 4 titles (3 doubles and 1 single). 2nd place – Corey Gauff (1 singles + 2 doubles).

WTA 500 Berlin

The first two seeds of the competition in the German capital were Arina Sobolenko and Elena Rybakina. Fortunately, both were eliminated in the 2nd round. Only tennis player #3 remained in the quarterfinals – Carolina Garcia (3), Petra Kvitova (7) and Maria Sakkari (6), and Kvitova and Garcia played each other.

On June 24, 33-year-old Petra won 2 matches at once, defeating Carolina and then the Russian Alexandrova (Berlin had game transfers due to the rains). In the final of the tournament, experienced Czech faced Donna Vekic, with whom she fought in two sets.

For Kvitova, this trophy was the 31st in her career. It is worth noting that the Czech never left a set during the tournament. Petra made her 7th final on grass courts and won her 6th championship.

Getty Images/Global Images Ukraine. Petra Kvitova

ATP 500 London

Can Carlos Alcaraz be considered a favorite before the tournament starts? Yes, it’s the #1 seed, yes, the #2 ATP seed, but its balance on the turf was 4/4. However, the composition of the participants was appropriate for Carlitos. All the best guys with hits that would theoretically be tough for Alcaraz went to play in Halle.

In fact, only Arthur Riederknech could beat the Spaniard and with the status of a lucky loser. The Frenchman is a tall, powerful serve, but a board game as is typical of the served. Artur took the first set from Alcaraz, lost the second in the fight, went ahead with a timeout in the third set, but could not keep the advantage, the game turned into a tie-break and the young Spaniard confidently scored. 7:3.

Then Carlos calmly walked along the grid, on the way beat Jiri Legechka, Grigor Dimitrov, Sebastian Korda and won against Alex De Minaura in the final. For Alcaraz, this is the first championship on grass courts. In total, he has 10 trophies at ATP level and one victory at the 2022 US Open.

Getty Images/Global Images Ukraine. carlos alcaraz

ATP 500 Halle

Best tournament, Federer’s favourite. “Best seeds”: Medvedev, Tsitsipas, Rublev, Sinner, Khurkach, Chorich, Agut, Zverev … Medvedev was eliminated in the quarterfinals by Agut, Sinner – by Bublik, Zverev – in the semi-finals by Bublik, Tsitsipas and Khurkach. Performances in the 2nd round and Coric – and he did it in the first round.

In the final, two psychopaths met, more precisely, Alexander Bublik and Andrey Rublev. won the victory katsapsky sweater tennis player

Bublik played in the ATP final for the 8th time and won his second title.

Getty Images/Global Images Ukraine. Alexander Bublik

Daria Snigur

It’s no secret that the lawn is Daria’s favorite cover. Naturally, she plays the fewest matches, but she still won junior Wimbledon in 2019.

In 2023, Daria played 9.5 matches on the grass field. After a good week beating world number 10 Beatriz Haddad Maia in Nottingham, Snigur went to compete in 100,000th at Ilkley. Meanwhile, Daria is also preparing for Wimbledon, where she will start from qualifying.

The Ukrainian player made a strong start to the Ilkley competitions, lifting the classification of 74th racket Anna-Karolina Shmidlova. Given the composition of the participants, it seemed that Daria could reach the final. But the rains played a cruel joke on the Ukrainian. On June 22, Daria had to play 2 matches in a row. He confidently tackled Sachia Vickery in the 1/8 finals, plus or minus, and then went to Sweden’s Mirjam Bjorklund.

Unfortunately, it was not possible to defeat Denis Shapovalov’s girlfriend. Yes, and also play a full match. Daria lost 4 starting matches and withdrew from the fight. Problems with physique, just to save strength or really some kind of injury – unknown. But even in Nottingham, the Ukrainian player received a medical break during the match against Bulter. Then there was a problem with the leg.

Getty Images/Global Images Ukraine. Daria Snigur

Julia Starodubtseva

Julia made a rather unexpected decision. Moreover, after the victory in Sumter, Starodubtseva went to 25 thousand in Santo Domingo to play hard on red clay. The first was the first game on the field for the Ukrainian, and the second was the first game outside the United States. All this gives the right to conclude that the Ukrainian chose a somewhat strange and possibly wrong option. Plus, it has to be taken into account that Yulia is determined to qualify for the US Open, by her own words, so why go play clay when there is a hard 25k race in Wichita in parallel in the US? Yulia may be the third seed…

However, in any case, no one has the right to condemn Julia. Progress is obvious, and most likely it was just a desire to try yourself on the ground. As a result, in the first round of the competition, the Ukrainian, who was the clear favorite of the meeting, lost in two sets to Anya Vangelova.

It is worth noting that the tournament was a success for Yulia. Along with Ana Sofia Sanchez, she reached the final, where she lost to Maria Gonzalez / Ksenia Laskutova in a tense super tie-break 9:11.

Vitaly Sachko and Alexey Krutykh

After his victory at the Challenger in Bratislava, Vitaliy immediately went to Poznan for the soil tournament. He withdrew from the tournament after losing the first set in a tie-break against Ukrainian Ulysses Blanch. Then Vitaly withdrew from couples. The official reason for withdrawal from the tournament is a groin injury.

Aleksey Krutykh started and finished his Wimbledon preparations at the Challenger at Ilkley. The Ukrainian started from qualifying by defeating Rio Noguchi in the first round. It is worth noting that for the first time Alexei played a match on the grass. Then the first issue of Ukrainian men’s tennis went to the promising Chinese Shang Junchen, who lost in two sets. Just today, June 26, Krutykh will play against Fabian Marozhan in the first qualifying round for Wimbledon.

Vladislav Orlov’s Prize

Orlov can record his 25,000th performance at Poprad as his asset. In singles, Vladislav reached the semi-finals where he lost to Patrick Rikl.

In a pair, Orlov won the cup. The Ukrainian, along with Daniel Paty, was to play in the final against the duo Denis Istomin / Evgeny Karlovsky, but the opponents did not come to the match.

For Orlov, this trophy became the first pairs of the season. In total, he has 12 titles in doubles.

Instagram. Daniel Pati and Vladislav Orlov

Successful return of the Kolb brothers

Maria and Nadezhda Kolb won the clay 15,000th in Gdansk. In 4 matches, the Kolb brothers lost only 1 set.

Interestingly, for the Ukrainians this was only the second tournament in 2023 (they have not competed since the beginning of January). Crimean natives have played in the doubles finals of ITF tournaments for the 25th time in their career and won their 8th title (third since August 2023). The victory in Gdansk brought the Ukrainians $ 955 in prize money and 10 rating points.

After the award, Nadezhda posted a photo on her Instagram and signed the post as unique to any sane person:

“Glory to Ukraine! Glory to the nation! Crimea, Ukraine”.

Anita Sagdieva

19-year-old Ukrainian Anita Sagdieva also performed well in ITF competitions. In the 15,000th race in San Diego, the Ukrainian, along with the Malaika Rapolu, advanced to the doubles final. Unfortunately, the trophy was not won. The Ukrainian-American duo lost in sets against American couple Sarah Daavettila / Katerina Hu.

Interestingly, Anita reached the final in pairs on the same courts last week. Then he didn’t win.

In total, Anita has two trophies in a pair at ITF level. Both are on the field in 2021.