According to WTA, when the draw came out for the Rogers Cup it included the entire Top 20 plus Serena Williams which is why many of the players are comparing the event in Toronto, Canada to a Grand Slam!
Below is the video featuring Francesca Schiavone, Caroline Wozniacki, Victoria Azarenka, Petra Kvitova & Li Na who tell us what they’d been up to on their holidays and how they’ve prepared for the big events.
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This past week in the World Team Tennis ‘Bubble” I have seen the efforts to keep everyone safe while carrying on a team competition with around 60/70 players and coaches onsite. Counting organizers, officials, media, and support personnel are around 150 people trying hard to make this happen. I am very impressed by how the strict protocol has been handled and how everyone is invested in making this event a success, but The Open is a completely different scale of details.
It does not matter that you get your rating playing locally or that you had spent an insidious amount of money playing the ITF junior tour tournaments. Your rating is your level of play (you get no bonus for playing more or playing far away). This allows us to break free of the ITF competitive structure potentially saving us time, money, and headache. We see this as a great opportunity to improve the logistic of our sport.
As revealed in a recent news release issued by the WTA Tour – Brandon Burke has been elected to the WTA Board of Directors (to start officially in September). Oncourt got together with Brandon to delve a bit more into his background and to gain some insight into this wonderful appointment he has attained at such a young age.
