Venus Meets Zvonareva in WTA Doha Championships

Posted on November 9, 2008

This is the seventh meeting between Venus Williams, a two-time Championships semifinalist, and Vera Zvonareva, who qualified for the event in 2004, but failed to win a round robin match. Zvonareva won the first match the pair ever played, at the French Open in 2003, but has not won a set against Williams since.

The undisputed form players of the week, both Williams and Zvonareva boast a perfect 4-0 record at the SEC – Doha 2008; they have won and lost the same number of sets (8-3) and won the same number of games (60, although Zvonareva has lost seven more games); they have also spent almost exactly the same amount of time on court (just over eight hours in total).

This is the first time the No.7 and No.8 seeds have battled it out for the end-of-season title since the round robin format was introduced in 2003; the previous ‘lowest’ seeds to contest the final were No.6 Serena Williams and No.7 Maria Sharapova in 2004. The last time a player reached the final on less than a No.8 seeding was 1995, under the 16-player knock-out format (No.1 Steffi Graf d. unseeded Anke Huber, ranked 11th at the time).

Each player is gunning for her third title of the season: Williams won at Wimbledon and Zürich; Zvonareva at Prague and Guangzhou.

Should Williams win the title and the $1,340,000 million first prize, she’ll overtake Martina Navratilova for fourth place on the all-time list of top prize money earners in women’s tennis (see Williams profile below).

DOUBLES CHAMPIONSHIP FACTS
Defending champions Cara Black and Liezel Huber are aiming to win their 10th title of 2008 (they won nine in 2007); they're contesting their 12th final of the season.

Kveta Peschke and Rennae Stubbs are aiming to win the title on their second attempt as a team; last year they lost to Black and Huber in the semifinals; they have won one title so far this year, the Tier I Qatar Total Open, also played at Doha’s Khalifa Tennis Complex.

Before winning the title in 2007 with Huber, Black had been runner-up five times in the previous six years - 2001, 2002 (both w/Likhovtseva), 2004, 2005, 2006 (w/Stubbs).

Peschke is the only player among the two teams who has not previously won the Tour Championships; Stubbs won in 2001 with Lisa Raymond.

Black and Huber will finish 2008 co-ranked No.1; they achieved the same feat in 2007, when they became only the second team since the inception of computer doubles rankings in 1984 to end a season in that joint position (after Lisa Raymond and Samantha Stosur in 2006). (WTA)