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The finalists for the 2015 WTA Comeback Player Of The Year have been released, and we want to hear from you, the fans. The fan vote will count as one of the coveted media votes.

Have a look at the finalists and cast your vote before Sunday, December 6 at 11:59pm ET! The winner will be announced Tuesday, December 8.

2015 WTA Comeback Player Of The Year Finalists

Venus Williams: Venus Williams could be forgiven for tapering down her schedule, picking and choosing her outings on tour. Instead, the seven-time major winner, now in her mid-30s, has just enjoyed her busiest – and most successful – season in years. Williams began it with victory in Auckland and then defeat to Madison Keys in a barnstorming Australian Open quarterfinal. There was no slowing down as the year wore on, the American repelling the challenge of a number of the game’s bright young things en route to further titles in Wuhan and Zhuhai, helping her to rejoin sister Serena in the Top 10 once again.

Bethanie Mattek-Sands: Bethanie Mattek-Sands had a lot of catching up to do at the start of 2015. Ranked outside the Top 250 in both singles and doubles following hip surgery the previous March, the American provided a reminder of her swashbuckling all-court game with a third round run at the Australian Open. She did even better in the doubles, her impromptu partnership alongside Lucie Safarova coming away with the title. There was plenty more success to come – in both formats – credible runs at Wimbledon and the US Open, as well as four more titles alongside Safarova, sending her shooting up the rankings.

Anastasija Sevastova: In 2013, long battles with illness and injury had taken their toll on Anastasija Sevastova, forcing her to walk away from tennis. However, this January she returned to the fold in spectacular fashion, winning her first 13 matches, picking up two ITF Circuit titles in the process. The wins kept coming as the tour headed onto the clay and by the summer she was ready to make her WTA bow, qualifying for Bad Gastein before reaching the semifinals one week later in Florianopolis. This rehabilitation continued in her final WTA outing of the year, the Kremlin Cup, where she made it through qualifying, going on to upset Karolina Pliskova en route to another quarterfinal.

Kateryna Bondarenko: Mothers on tour are few and far between, and Kateryna Bondarenko added to their number last year when she returned to the WTA following the birth of her first child. After finding success hard to come by at first, the Ukrainian began to get into the swing of things this summer, appearing in a WTA quarterfinal (Istanbul) and Grand Slam main draw (US Open) for the first time since rejoining the professional ranks. These performances, which included a win over Venus Williams in Turkey, took the Ukrainian back into the Top 100 – a position she last occupied in August 2012.

WTA Comeback Player of the Year Winners

2014: Mirjana Lucic-Baroni
2013: Alisa Kleybanova
2012: Yaroslava Shvedova
2011: Sabine Lisicki 
2010: Justine Henin 
2009: Kim Clijsters 
2008: Zheng Jie 
2007: Lindsay Davenport 
2006: Martina Hingis 
2005: Kim Clijsters 

Click here to see all the WTA Comeback Player of the Year Winners

How it works:

Finalists are selected by wtatennis.com

Comeback Player of the Year criteria includes a player whose ranking previously dropped due to injury or personal reasons and current season’s results helped restore ranking

Winner is then determined by a media vote with a fan vote counting as one media vote

PRAGUE, Czech Republic – Not everyone can win every week. That is impossible. But sometimes, when you are trying as hard as you can, eventually you will turn the page.

That is exactly what occurred for Karolina Pliskova on Sunday, as she won twice to help the Czech Republic defeat Russia 3-2 and win the Fed Cup final in Prague.

The 23-year-old Pliskova has had a fine year, ending the season ranked No.11. She reached the final of Sydney and Dubai on hardcourts. She won a tournament in Prague on clay in April. She reached the final at Birmingham on grass and on hardcourt on Stanford in early July.

But after that, the huge-serving Pliskova slid a little bit, until two weeks ago, when she decided that she was going to give it her all before the season ended. She reached the final against Venus Williams at the WTA Elite Trophy Zhuhai in a very close contest. When she arrived at Prague, she was ready.

“The year was great but there was some ups and downs,” Pliskova told wtatennis.com. “The season is long so it cannot just be up the whole year. I was a little bit tired at the end of the year. The last two weeks of this year I did everything I could to make it good and to have a good end.

“I know if I’m ready and fit and mentally ready for matches I can play good and beat anyone, but it cannot be the whole year. I’m just happy about the last two weeks of my season. This end is unbelievable.”

On Saturday, Pliskova fell against Maria Sharapova in two tight sets. Her teammate Petra Kvitova had defeated Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in three sets. They were tied 1-1, but they all knew that either team had a legitimate chance to win the title.

Sharapova, who was thrilled to be playing the Fed Cup final for the first time, lit up the court when she was against the wall and upended Kvitova, who had just defeated the five-time Grand Slam champion a week ago in the semifinals of the WTA Finals in Singapore.

Russia was up 2-1 and the pressure was squarely on Pliskova as she stepped on court against Pavlyuchenkova. She had never played singles before this week at the O2 Arena, where 10,800 fans were cheering her but were extremely tense.

On Sunday, Pliskova got up and was not thrilled that she went down against Sharapova, but she knew she could triumph if she stayed in there and lifted her game.

“She was competitive against Maria but she was unhappy she lost to her – and that was a good sign because she went out to win it, and she didn’t,” said her captain Petr Pala. “But she was out there in front of big stars for the first time. It helped her. [On Sunday,] we felt she was the best player. She became confident and once she did, she wasn’t afraid.”

This time, Pliskova kept breathing, she relaxed, and she was self-assured. She nailed her massive first serve and forehand. She never wavered and took down Pavlyuchenkova in straight sets.

But now she had to step up again. Another Czech, Lucie Safarova, was unable to play this weekend due to a wrist injury. Safarova had reached the Roland Garros final in singles, and she won two doubles crowns at the majors with her friend Bethanie Mattek-Sands, the 2015 Australian Open and the French Open.

It was more than likely that Safarova would have played the Fed Cup doubles if not injured, but she couldn’t, so Pliskova went back on court. She and Barbora Strycova would face Pavlyuchenkova and Elena Vesnina, an excellent doubles player who reached finals at Indian Wells, Miami and Wimbledon. The Russians could have been seen as favored.

But there was Pliskova. She and the quick Strycova lost in the first set and the Russians looked very good and directed. Then Pliskova rose again, loong extremely patient and smart. The young player was very confident and didn’t back off. They won the crown, they jumped up and down and they had a fourth title in the last five years.

Three years ago, Safarova won both matches and sealed it, with the Czechs beating Serbia for the title in Prague.

Last year once again Prague, Kvitova won both matches, taking down over Germany and wildly celebrating.

This time, it was Pliskova’s turn.

It might have been an up and down year, but it finished on a high note. Next year, with this victory as inspiration, she could keep climbing.

“I can go a little bit higher but it depends on the results and the start of the year,” she said. “If I’m playing good I can win those bigger matches and go far in the tournament but sometimes it’s not happening. I will prepare good this year and hopefully be ready for the next year.”

She then smiled: “No reason to be sad right now.”

Vote Now: Most Improved Player

November 17, 2015

Timea Bacsinszky, Anna Karolina Schmiedlova, Belinda Bencic, Karolina Pliskova, Johanna Konta – who gets your vote for WTA Most Improved Player Of The Year?

TAIPEI, Chinese Taipei – This week wtatennis.com is offering free live streaming from the penultimate WTA 125K Series tournament of 2015, the OEC Taipei WTA Challenger.

Watch free live streaming from Taipei all week right here!

Taipei is the fifth of six WTA 125K Series events scheduled for 2015, and, despite coming at the end of the tennis calendar’s home straight, has a few familiar faces in the draw. Heading the list of seeds are a couple of upwardly mobile players, Misaki Doi and Yaroslava Shvedova, both of whom have recently lifted silverware, in Luxembourg and Hua Hin, respectively.

The WTA 125K Series has provided the platform that helped launch the careers of some of the brightest young talents on the tour, as Kristina Mladenovic and Elina Svitolina – the winners of the inaugural events, in Taipei and Pune – proved by establishing themselves in the Top 30.

Vying with Doi and Shvedova this week will be a couple of gifted prospects, including Patricia Maria Tig and Wang Yafan, as well as more established names such as former Grand Slam semifinalists Kimiko Date-Krumm and Kirsten Flipkens.

Watch them attempt to follow in Mladenovic’s and Svitolina’s footsteps all week here on wtatennis.com!