Drop Shots

Saturday, 3 July 2010

Spotlight On ... Alison Riske

America's Alison Riske made her big emergence at Birmingham just a few weeks ago, where she qualified and caused a string of upsets over players like Aleksandra Wozniak, Anna Chakvetadze and Yanina Wickmayer, before losing to Maria Sharapova in a three-set battle. Her exploits there were rewarded with a wildcard into the Wimbledon main draw., where she was again drawn against Wickmayer. On that occasion, it was the Belgian who triumphed after a three-set win.

Alison made her WTA debut on the clay in Charleston (USA) in April 2010, where she lost to # 64 Angelique Kerber in straight sets. Back on the ITF circuit, she had a couple of first-round exits to players who were slightly lower ranked than herself before reaching a semi-final in $50k Raleigh (USA) (l. to compatriot Lindsay Lee-Waters). She fell in the first round of qualifying at Roland Garros (l. to Anna Tatishvili) and reached the quarters at $50k Nottingham (l. to 6th seed Xinyun Han). Then came the breakthrough moment in Birmingham, which helped her to achieve her

career-high ranking of # 145 was achieved in June 2010 after her good run in Birmingham. Surprisingly, the ITF event in Nottingham the week before was her first grass court event.

She is coached by her sister, Sarah, who was also a tennis player.

Read Alison's "Getting to Know" interview on the WTA website here.

Friday, 2 July 2010

Upcoming Posts

It's going to be a busy week or so here at Drop Shots as I look to get some new (or updated) posts going again. Who can you expect to see some Spotlight On ... posts for?

Planned posts so far are:

Kristyna Pliskova
Sachie Ishizu
Tsvetana Pironkova (update)
Petra Kvitova (update)

If you've got any requests or suggestions for players that you want me to profile, feel free to leave a comment or Tweet me! The Twitter link is in the right sidebar or you can just go here.