Laurie's Tennis articles

2017 is proving to be a challenging period for the players who hold the world number one position in tennis. Angelique Kerber regained the top ranking from Serena Williams during the clay court season whilst Andy Murray has been struggling to make an impression, with many early exits from tournaments since the season began at the end of December. What is really interesting is how similar the situation is for both players and I think this is worth exploring further.  The best way to do that would be to chart Angelique’s and Andy’s accent to number 1. For Angelique, 2016 was a great year; the best year of her career and may turn out to be the best ever year she will experience. Not many players in history have won two grand slam titles in one season and played in three finals. Not only that, Angelique also got to the finals of the Olympics, Cincinnati and the year end championships in Singapore.  The only slight downside would be that she could have won more finals an...

Johanna Konta wins Miami Open The clay court season is underway and we are about to embark on another great period of spring and summer tennis. This is a good opportunity to take a look at the one of the hottest properties on the tour right now in Johanna Konta.  Johanna has made a dramatic rise up the rankings in the last two seasons to a career high position of seven and recently won the prestigious Miami Open title, one of the biggest titles outside of grand slam level.  Let’s take a look at how Johanna has got to this position, assess her strengths and weaknesses and try to predict how far she can get in her career. Serve Johanna possesses one of the better serves on the WTA tour.  Johanna is a tall player at 1m 80 (5 ft. 11) and thus able to extend up and serve well into the corners.  Another asset for Johanna is her ability to consistently produce first serves of over 100mph which keeps her opponents honest more often than not.  As regar...