Over November 29-December 3 and December 6-10, we'll run down our Top 10 Matches of the 2021 season. No. 10 | No. 9

BRISBANE—No. 2 Simona Halep has pulled out of Brisbane due to a sore Achilles. She wants to play the Australian Open, but isn’t sure if she can yet. The Romanian will go to the Sydney tournament next week and she hopes to play, but she cannot run fast now. “I

Sleep is for the weak, some say. That adage may not apply to professional tennis players however, especially Linda Noskova. “I love to sleep. Last three days I really slept like a lot, so that's really great,” the Czech told press in Adelaide. No one should be sleeping on the

Juan Carlos Ferrero continues his fine run at smaller claycourt tournaments, winning Umag with a 6-4, 6-4 victory over Potito Starace. In February, Ferrero won Costa do Sauipe and Buenos Aires and reached the final of Acapulco. "I'm very happy about this tournament. It gives me a lot of confidence

We covered hundreds of stories on The Break in 2024, from Novak Djokovic's Olympic run to Simona Halep's return to pro tennis ... and much, much more. This season was full of incredible moments, and as the year comes to an end, we ranked the most notable:

As the World Cup kicks off, defending champion Italy is drawing inspiration from Francesca Schiavone's run to the French Open title. ''On Saturday afternoon, in the room in Geneva, I was glued to the TV," Italy's football coach Marcello Lippi told the ANSA news agency. ''Her performance was symbolic of

Serbian Minister of Foreign Affairs Vuk Jeremic will be named the new president of the Tennis Players Union of Serbia, Blic reports. The players union will include Novak Djokovic, Janko Tipsarevic, Viktor Troicki, Nenad Zimonjic and Davis Cup captain Bogdan Obradovic. The organization will be run by Srdjan Djokovic, Novak’s

Despite being admittedly tired after his run to the U.S. Open final, Rafael Nadal decides to give it a go in Spain’s Davis Cup semifinal tie against France on Cordoba on Friday. Nadal will face France’s Richard Gasquet, whom he is 9-0 against. "I like to play on clay, but

Novak Djokovic is playing Monte Carlo with a wrist problem after injuring it last week. The telltale sign was a strip of blue physio tape running up under his wristband and forearm. Despite the injury, Djokovic managed to win his opening-round match against Albert Montanes in just 45 minutes. "I

NEW YORK—Squinting into the afternoon sun, Paul-Henri Mathieu wore the exasperated look of a man searching for inroads into rallies, only to run into a dead end at every turn. Novak Djokovic's serving precision, comprehensive court coverage, and stinging baseline strokes turned today's second-round match into Grand Slam gridlock for

PATTAYA, Thailand (AP) Daniela Hantuchova defeated an angry Vera Zvonareva 7-6 (3), 6-4 Saturday in the semifinals of the Pattaya Open, ending her hopes of a third straight title. Zvonareva's 13-match winning streak at the tournament came to an end shortly after she was deducted a point for swearing in

For her fifth title this season, Ashleigh Barty claimed the Western & Southern Open for the first time. The Aussie completed the feat in dominating fashion, not dropping a single set throughout her run. With the 6-3, 6-1 victory over world No. 76 Jil Teichmann, Barty increased her trophy cabinet

“It was very hard for me, to beat two Top 10 guys. And (Grigor) Dimitrov also was playing well. It was one of the greatest weeks for me. It’s unfortunate to get injured but it’s still a very exciting week.”—Kei Nishikori, in a press conference announcing his withdrawal from the

DELRAY BEACH, Fla. (AP) American Rajeev Ram upset fourth-seeded Grigor Dimitrov of Bulgaria 6-4, 6-3 on Saturday in the Delray Beach Open semifinals. American Sam Querrey beat Argentina's Juan Martin del Potro 7-5, 7-5 in the second semifinal. The last All-American final on the ATP Tour was last April when

It was the most routine and innocuous-looking of forehand shanks. It came in the first game of the match. But it ended up making all the difference. When Stefanos Tsitsipas beat Roger Federer at the Australian Open in January, he did it first and foremost by saving break points: all

WATCH: Swiatek clinched her 3-0 round-robin record against Coco Gauff on Saturday.

Former Top 5 player Anna Chakvetadze says she is unsure when she will return to the WTA. The 24-year-old Russian was beset with illness most of the past season. She is running as a candidate for Russia's Right Cause party in the forthcoming elections for the Duma. "This year was

LONDON (AP) — The International Tennis Federation and the groups that run the U.S. Open, French Open and Wimbledon pledged a total of $400,000 on Monday to help the relief efforts for the Australian wildfires. The donations will go to the Australian Red Cross. The death toll in Australia has

We’re familiar with 8-6, 9-7, even an 11-9 or two. But no one, not even a couple of kids pretending they’re playing the final of Wimbledon, would let their imaginations run all the way to 70-68. There isn’t enough time in the day. In fact, as John Isner and Nicolas

In a word: plyometrics. Being one who loathes long-distance running, which isn't terribly conducive cross-training for tennis anyway, Venus Williams opts for a mix of jump exercises (the aforementioned plyometrics) and typically performs the moves early in a workout, when muscles are fresh, per Self magazine. "It's a lot more