Improvements Top Stars in Women's Tennis Must Make in 2015
The 2014 WTA season saw four different women capture Grand Slam titles and many others made their names known. It was as open-ended a year as any in recent memory.
Serena Williams had another dominant season, but even she slipped up and suffered several crushing defeats.
While Maria Sharapova and Petra Kvitova both captured major titles, their games remained far from complete.
Even Caroline Wozniacki and Ana Ivanovic asserted themselves throughout the year as contenders again, though they came up short when it mattered the most.
There were plenty of breakout stars in 2014, notably Eugenie Bouchard and Simona Halep, who cemented their candidacy as the future queens of tennis.
On the other end of the spectrum, Victoria Azarenka faded from the top of tennis due to injuries and opened the door for other players.
The following slideshow will examine one area those women need to focus on in 2015 in order to improve and stake their claim as the best in the world.
Caroline Wozniacki: Play More Aggressively
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The Caroline Wozniacki forehand and backhand are two of the most consistent shots in women's tennis.
Rallies are her best friend on the court—Wozniacki thrives on extended points and waiting for her opponent to blink first. That style of play carried her to the year-end No. 1 ranking in 2010 and 2011, but it hasn't rewarded her with an elusive first Grand Slam title.
Wozniacki's counterpunching tactics work quite well against most players, yet when she plays power hitters, her defensive mindset leaves her vulnerable.
Friend and frequent tormenter Serena Williams owns a 10-1 career record over Wozniacki and was the Dane's biggest roadblock in 2014. Though Wozniacki enjoyed a strong season (42-15), she couldn't find the firepower to close out Serena.
The two played four matches this year, with all of them going Serena's way. Three of the four encounters (Montreal, Cincinnati and Paris) went the distance. But Wozniacki's lack of offensive weapons kept her from crossing the finish line each time.
They also faced off in the U.S. Open final, where Serena bullied Wozniacki for a 6-3, 6-3 win.
To burst through and win her first major, Wozniacki will have to play more aggressively. She started to change her patterns late in the year, which lead to some of her best tennis and those near-defeats of Serena.
""My best tennis is when I'm aggressive and I take the initiative." @CaroWozniacki speaking on Game Set & Mats. #USOpen #Eurosporttennis
— Eurosport (@Eurosport) August 31, 2014"
Aggressive play for Wozniacki includes hitting more shots up the line and going for winners, rather than playing safe and continually hitting crosscourt.
Once Wozniacki becomes more comfortable with attacking, she may finally win her maiden Slam.
Eugenie Bouchard: Results Outside of Majors
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Eugenie Bouchard was the breakthrough star in women's tennis this year.
In just her second season, Bouchard climbed into the top 10, peaking at a career-high No. 5 before finishing her campaign ranked seventh in the world.
Bouchard also qualified for her first WTA Championships appearance and was named the WTA Most Improved Player.
The 20-year-old saved her best tennis for the biggest stages.
Bouchard raced into the quarters at the Australian Open, which she followed up with a semifinal appearance at the French Open. At Wimbledon, she advanced to her first major final. Though Petra Kvitova bounced her in two sets, Bouchard earned her status as a worthy contender.
The bright lights of the big events didn't faze Bouchard, but she couldn't shine on the smaller stages.
Bouchard was just 26-19 outside of the four Grand Slams. The Canadian fell in the first or second round in 10 of the 21 non-major events she played, which included nine losses to players ranked below No. 40, as Chris Chase noted for USA Today.
Not only did those defeats keep her from a higher ranking, but they left her far from battle-tested. In Bouchard's Grand Slam losses, she didn't have a lot of experience from which to draw, and she fell to veterans like Kvitova and Maria Sharapova.
For Bouchard to keep challenging for Grand Slams, she'll have to play better in the warmup events. Winning breeds confidence and momentum. To lift her first major championship, she'll need plenty of both.
Victoria Azarenka: Fitness
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Victoria Azarenka fell apart in 2014.
Her body betrayed her, and she suffered injuries to her knee and foot, which severely compromised her ability to train and compete.
Azarenka played only 24 matches this season, skipping the French Open and nine of the 11 WTA Premier events.
The foot issues started not long after her quarterfinal run in Australia. Azarenka sat out much of the spring nursing the injury before returning at Wimbledon, but she looked slow in a second-round loss to Bojana Jovanovski.
During the summer, Azarenka injured her right knee in Montreal and was forced to skip Cincinnati. She gutted out the pain at the U.S. Open and reached the quarterfinals, but Ekaterina Makarova ended her run.
Azarenka would play just two more matches in 2014, and she waved the white flag on her season in September to further rehab her foot and knee problems, as Sky Sports reported.
Unable to stay on the court, Azarenka's ranking has dipped to No. 31.
As she trains for the 2015 season, Azarenka has to improve her fitness to overcome those injuries and the rust from all that time away from competition.
Azarenka will need to be in peak physical shape to once again be a title contender.
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Ana Ivanovic: Grand Slam Results
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Resurgence defined Ana Ivanovic's 2014 season.
The Serbian reached six finals, winning four of them and compiling a 58-17 record for the year. Ivanovic charged back into the top 10 and finished the year at No. 5, the first time she's ended a season ranked inside the top 12 since 2008.
Ivanovic won more titles (Auckland, Monterrey, Birmingham and Tokyo) in 2014 than she had in her previous five seasons combined. Her only finals losses came to Maria Sharapova in Stuttgart and Serena Williams in Cincinnati.
Unfortunately, that level of play didn't carry over to Grand Slam tournaments.
Her best result at a major this year came at the Australian Open, where she reached the quarterfinals before losing to Eugenie Bouchard (7-5, 5-7, 2-6) in a tense match. Ivanovic wouldn't reach the second week at any of the other Grand Slam events.
She lost in third round at both the French Open (3-6, 3-6 to Lucie Safarova) and Wimbledon (4-6, 6-3, 1-6 to Sabine Lisicki). In New York, her slump continued with a 5-7, 4-6 loss to Karolina Pliskova in the second round.
Aside from her stunning victory over Serena Williams in the Australian Open fourth round, Ivanovic's sloppiest tennis often came out in the majors. In that loss to Pliskova, she sprayed the ball, committing 39 unforced errors in just two sets. That same problem plagued her in the French Open loss to Safarova (30 unforced errors).
No player won more matches in 2014 than Ivanovic. But she'll have to prove in 2015 that her success can carry over at the Grand Slam level.
Petra Kvitova: Movement
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On the lawns of Wimbledon this summer, Petra Kvitova demolished Eugenie Bouchard for her second Grand Slam title.
The tall Czech used her lefty serve and firepower to storm through the tournament. The short points of grass court tennis masked her main weakness.
Kvitova's long frame makes her a less than stellar mover on the court. She lacks elite foot speed and doesn't change direction well, leaving her susceptible to shots hit behind her.
Away from Wimbledon, Kvitova hasn't reached a final at the other majors, and she's never advanced past the fourth round at the U.S. Open.
For a player who hits the ball as cleanly and flatly as Kvitova does, she should be challenging for more titles, especially on fast hard courts. But her movement has often held her back.
It's an area Kvitova has acknowledged in the past she needs to improve, as Matt Cronin detailed for Tennis.com.
Without top-level movement and fitness, Kvitova doesn't have time to set up her powerful shots.
This fall, she's been working with Alex Stober, a fitness trainer who has served players like Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi.
To start winning on all surfaces, Kvitova will have to keep improving the way she moves on the court or she'll be left stuck in the mud.
Simona Halep: Performance Late in Big Tournaments
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Simona Halep keeps raising the bar for herself.
The 2013 WTA Most Improved Player, Halep took another gigantic step forward in 2014, going 38-11 and reaching four finals. She won the biggest title of her career to date in Doha and finished runner-up at the French Open, WTA Championships and Madrid.
Her run to the Roland Garros final (4-6, 7-6, 4-6 loss to Maria Sharapova) highlighted her season, which also included a quarterfinals appearance at the Australian Open and a semifinals berth at Wimbledon. Her only major stumble came at the U.S. Open when she lost in the third round to Mirjana Lucic-Baroni in straight sets.
As great a season as Halep had in 2014, she didn't play her best tennis late in big tournaments.
An aggressive baseliner and counterpuncher, Halep couldn't solve Sharapova, who won all three of their matches.
Halep, currently ranked No. 3 in the world, is close to winning Grand Slam titles. Like Wozniacki, she needs to be more assertive in matches against heavy hitters.
The Romanian showed glimpses of that potential in a 6-0, 6-2 destruction of Serena Williams in the round-robin stage of the WTA Championships. She just couldn't re-create it during their rematch in the finals, which Serena won 6-3, 6-0.
To continue her rise to the top of women's tennis, Halep needs to beat the best when it matters most. Once she solves that riddle, she'll be a title threat for years to come.
Maria Sharapova: Serve
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Maria Sharapova possesses some of the most devastating power in women's tennis.
She's capable of scorching winners on both wings and leaving her opponents eating dust. That power too often disappears once she steps to the service line.
Her matches have become battles of attrition. Though she remains an outstanding returner and defensive shot-maker, her own service games are highly susceptible to breaks.
Because of shoulder issues that have plagued Sharapova for most of her career, she's had to change her service motion several times. Coupled with an unusually high ball toss, it's tough for the Russian to find a consistent rhythm. When she can't get the first serve in, things fall apart.
Sharapova double-faulted a whopping 369 times in 2014, according to WTA statistics.
"Sharapova, Maria: discovering ways to break her own serve in every style possible.
— Shivank (@Shivank17) August 15, 2014"
Those free points she gives away makes it tougher for her to close out matches.
At the French Open, where the slow clay neutralizes big servers, Sharapova's return game has carried her to titles in 2012 and 2014. The other slams haven't been so kind.
Sharapova hasn't won a title at the other three majors since the 2008 Australian Open—before the shoulder surgery which forced her to adjust the serve. It's no coincidence, because grass and hard courts reward players with dominant serves.
Though she'll likely not be able to develop an overpowering serve this late into her career, finding more reliability with the shot and cutting down the double faults would help Sharapova win more majors.
Serena Williams: Consistency
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Serena Williams won her 18th career major in 2014 and was once again crowned the WTA Player of the Year.
Yet by her standards, she had a sub-par season.
Despite her titles at the U.S. Open, WTA Championships, Miami, Rome and Cincinnati, Serena also had puzzling defeats, including losses before the quarterfinals at three of the four Grand Slams.
In Australia, Serena was surprisingly overpowered by Ana Ivanovic in three sets (6-4, 3-6, 3-6), her only loss ever to the Serbian.
Serena entered the French Open as the defending champion, but left in the second round after a stunning loss (2-6, 2-6) to 20-year-old Garbine Muguruza.
Wimbledon provided more drama, as Serena fell prey to another huge upset, this time in the third round at the hands of Alize Cornet (6-1, 3-6, 4-6). The next day, she retired during her doubles match after a bizarre spell on the court, as S.L. Price examined for Sports Illustrated.
She righted the ship over the summer, capturing the title in Cincinnati and the big prize in New York, but she still has the specter of those Grand Slam losses hanging over her as the 2015 season looms.
At 33 years old, Serena is entering the latter stages of her career. To prove those three losses were outliers and not the start of a trend, she'll have to find consistency again in majors. With Margaret Smith Court's record of 24 Grand Slam titles not far from sight, Serena's work is far from done.
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