As the Monte Carlo Rolex Masters heads toward a pair of Saturday semifinals, it’s just as the oddsmakers predicted heading into the tournament: Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, and Andy Murray join a Swiss tennis player in the final four. Oh, wait: Stanislas Wawrinka, not Roger Federer, is the man representing Switzerland as the year’s first [...]

Sunny American tennis locales must not agree with Elena Dementieva. The woman widely regarded as the best player never to win a Grand Slam tournament on the WTA Tour fared poorly in the Indian Wells-Miami stretch of the 2009 season. Two weeks after a humiliating second-round loss amidst the palm trees of Southern California, Dementieva [...]

Tennis was not meant to be played in high winds, so when gusts of 20-30 miles per hour overwhelm a tennis match, the losing player can’t be blamed for inferior execution. The survivor should be saluted for enduring incredibly difficult conditions. Consider Vera Zvonareva, then, one of the better survival stories on the WTA Tour. [...]

Vera Zvonareva used to be the kind of player who would fuss when a match didn’t go her way. Friday afternoon in the California desert, this gifted Russian took a big step forward in the world of women’s tennis. No longer an emotionally volatile performer who would telegraph her feelings to an opponent, Zvonareva allowed [...]

I have to ask the question of all athletes, whether they’re tennis players or golfers, soccer players or wrestlers. How much is enough? The reason this has come to the forefront of my mind today is because I just read about Venus Williams reaching the semi final in Zürich where she is expected to win [...]