Tennis News

Serena Williams looks to move closer to her third Canadian Open title when she takes on Andrea Petkovic in tonight’s headline match in Toronto.

Serena is gearing up for one of the most important months of her career as she aims to secure her second Calendar Slam and fifth slam title in a row in a months time in New York.

At a stunning 41-1 on the year, Serena is in the midst of the best year of her career at age 33 and shows no signs of letting up. While the occasional blip shows in her matches, she still looks unstoppable at her best with very few ready to challenge her unless she has a very bad match or her serve collapses. Plenty such occasions showed in France and Wmbledon but she would always show enough grit to recover.

Petkovic, 0-4 against Serena,  is now back solidly in the top 20 but has looked shaky so far in her few matches since beginning the North American swing. Carina Witthoeft and Francoise Abanda took Petkovic to three setters while Mona Barthel was victorious in one in Stanford last week.

While it is unlikely to have any impact on who makes the final in general, the top half of the draw has seen 5 seeds out before the round of 16. Included in them were Lucie Safarova and Caroline Wozniacki while Ana Ivanovic remains the highest ranked possible opponent for the winner of this match before the final.

Expect Serena to push on in this match, having avoided a scare against Flavia Pennetta in her opener.

Mikhail Youzhny hopes to continue his recent revival in Montreal but will have his work cut out against three time winner and current world No.9 Rafael Nadal. Check out the Nadal vs Youzhny Head to Head.

Youzhny has had a torrid 2015, going just 6-18 prior to this event. He qualified thanks to wins over John Patrick Smith and Pierre Hugues Herbert before completing shock wins against Viktor Troicki and Gilles Simon in fairly straight forward fashion, not losing a set in any of his matches.

It signifies an impressive turnaround for the Russian who lost to a player ranked outside the top 400 last month and has fallen outside the top 100 himself, a mighty fall for the once top-10 player. A win tonight will ensure his return there but he is currently 99 in the live rankings.

Nadal hopes to keep his momentum going against an opponent he is 12-4 against and 7-0 against in the last seven – spanning a 7 year time frame. Nadal extended his winning streak to six with victory over Sergiy Stakhovsky to go with his Hamburg title.

The pair last met at the Australian Open where Nadal won easily in straight sets 6-2 6-3 6-2. While Youzhny seems to have found some form, the Russian has been on the decline for a while and will find it hard to take advantage against the Spaniard. Working in his favour though, despite having played 4 matches this week already, will be that none of them were lengthy affairs.

A quarter final date with Kei Nishikori or David Goffin awaits the winner. Nadal leads the head to head with Nishikori 6-0 but was mightily fortunate to win the last encounter after the Japanese star’s body failed him in the late moments. It is also worth noting the level of improvement by Nishikori over the period the head to head lasted.