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Spotlight On ... Stefanie Voegele

Stefanie Voegele is one of Switzerland's biggest tennis hopes. The 19-year-old is currently ranked at # 75, which is a career-high ranking. She broke into the top 100 in May after qualifying for Roland Garros and getting to the second round and reached the quarter-finals of Birmingham (l. to 4th seed Li Na after beating 6th seed Ekaterina Makarova) shortly afterwards. The win over Makarova (who was ranked # 43 at the time) was her career best win. In July, she reached the second round in Prague (l. to compatriot Timea Bacsinszky). On the ITF circuit, she has made finals in Romania and Nottingham.

Stefanie was a member of the Swiss Fed Cup team this year. Her country faced Australia in their World Group II play-off, with Stefanie facing Sam Stosur and Jelena Dokic in her rubbers. Although she lost both clashes, she proved herself to be a tough cookie.

Click here to read Stefanie's "Getting To Know" interview on the WTA Tour website

Off Court Photos: Istanbul Cup

Above: Patty Schnyder, Ipek Senoglu

Above: Vera Zvonareva

Above: Vera Dushevina

L-R: Anabel Medina Garrigues, Vera Dushevina, Aravane Rezai, Patty Schnyder, Vera Zvonareva, Ipek Senoglu, Cagla Buyukakcay

Spotlight On ... Noppawan Lertcheewakarn

After coming up short against British teenage Laura Robson, Noppawan Lertcheewakarn successfully hoisted the Girls' Singles title at Wimbledon today after defeating French top seed Kristina Mladenovic in three sets in the final. The Thai teenager is ranked # 406 on the WTA rankings, with a career-high ranking of # 314 that was achieved in May 2008. Noppawan has been likened to Monica Seles in terms of her style of play.

In 2009 so far, she was mixed ITF tournaments with the odd WTA event and has made a few forays back onto the junior circuit for the Grand Slam events. In February, she was given a wildcard into WTA Pattaya City (l. to Shahar Peer in the first round). Back on the ITF circuit, she suffered early exits in Sydney (l. to Ryoko Fuda in the second round after beating the top seed in the first round) and North Shore City (l. to Zi-Jun Yang in the first round) before reaching a final in Hamilton (l. to Ayu Fani Damayanti). Following this, she once again suffered early exits in Wellington (l. to So-Jung Kim in the first round), Hvar (l. to Karolina Kosinska in the second round), Bol (l. to Conny Perrin in the second round) and Makarska (l. to 8th seed Iveta Gerlova in the second round). All but Wellington were played on clay. It is pretty fair to say that her confidence probably wasn't that high going into junior Wimbledon, especially as she had lost in the first qualifying round of the senior tournament (l. to Vesna Manasieva, who went on to qualify for the main draw).

Spotlight On ... Viktoriya Kutuzova

Back in 2005, Viktoriya Kutuzova was ranked # 76 in the world, but slipped outside of the world's top 100 in subsequent years. As a fourteen-year-old, she was given a wildcard into WTA Los Angeles in 2003 and went on to reach the third round (l. to 4th seed Ai Sugiyama). The 2004 season was less eventful as she failed to progress beyond the first round of any of her WTA tournaments and played predominantly on the ITF circuit. In 2005, she was given a wildcard into WTA Indian Wells and reached the fourth round (l. to # 1 Lindsay Davenport). Although she failed to get past round one after that and lost in qualifying on several occasions, she entered the top 100 for the first time in her career that season after winning two singles titles (Deauville and Poitiers) on the ITF circuit.

The 2006 season saw her establish herself more with second rounds or better at Roland Garros, Wimbledon and the US Open. She also won another singles title on the ITF circuit (defending her Deauville title from the previous season). 2007 was less successful as she only notched up one second round appearance and was largely active on the ITF circuit.

In 2008, she won another ITF singles title, but it wasn't until 2009 that things started to get back on track again. In April 2009, she reached the third round of WTA Charleston (d. 11th seed Alona Bondarenko; l. to Elena Vesnina), reached the semi-finals of WTA Strasbourg as a qualifier (d. 5th seed Tamarine Tanasugarn; l. to eventual champion, Aravane Rezai) and the second round of Roland Garros (l. to Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez in three sets), and qualified for Wimbledon.

Spotlight On ... Grega Zemlja

Grega Zemlja probably isn't a name that is too familiar to the majority of tennis fans, but the Slovenian made a bit of a name for himself when he booked his place in the Wimbledon main draw today. Coming into the qualifying competition, he was ranked # 174, just below the career-high ranking of # 165 that he achieved in May 2009.

The 22-year-old was been playing predominantly on the Challenger circuit in 2009, although he was attempted to qualify for ATP tournaments in Sydney (l. to Frank Dancevic) and the Australian Open (l. to Dudi Sela). On the Challenger circuit, his best results have come in Burnie (l. to Brydan Klein in the final after beating another Aussie, Peter Luczak, in the semi-finals), and St Brieuc (l. to Frenchman Adrian Mannarino in the quarter-finals). Just prior to Wimbledon qualifying, he lost in the second qualifying round in Halle (l. to German Tobias Kamke, after struggling past Pavel Snobel in three tight sets in the previous round).

Spotlight On ... Klara Zakopalova

Now ranked # 100 in the world, Klara Zakopalova (formerly Klara Koukalova) was ranked # 27 back in March 2006. In her career, the Czech has won two WTA singles titles ('s-Hertogenbosch and Portoroz) and six ITF titles. Despite reaching her career-high ranking in 2005, the 2006 season saw her fail to finish in the top 100 for the first time in four years and she did not string two wins together for the whole of the 2006 season. She refound some form in 2007 with a semi-final showing in Prague and a quarter-final appearance in Bogota and the Tokyo Open, along with one ITF title. 2008 was another top 100 finish with a final in Vina del Mar and a semi-final in Estoril.

Klara's 2009 season got off a rocky start with first round exits in Auckland (l. to Edina Gallovits), Sydney (l. to Daniela Hantuchova as a qualifier), the Australian Open (l. to Samantha Stosur), Monterrey (l. to Vania King) , Indian Wells (l. to Kristina Barrois) and Miami (l. to Tathiana Garbin). She reached second rounds in Bogota (l. to Edina Gallovits again) and Acapulco (l. to 4th seed Iveta Benesova) but did not win back-to-back matches until April, when she reached the quarter-finals in Marbella (l. to 5th seed Carla Suarez Navarro after defeating top seeded Serena Williams). That was followed by early exits in Barcelona (l. to Magdalena Rybarikova) and Fes (l. to top seed and eventual champion Anabel Medina Garrigues) before securing a quarter-final spot in Warsaw (beat 3rd seed Jie Zheng for her sixth win over a top 20 player; l. to Daniela Hantuchova ). At Roland Garros, she pushed Serena Williams hard in their second round match before bowing out in three sets.

On the grass, Klara booked her place in the main draw of Wimbledon after notching up three wins in the qualifying tournament.