WTA Sept 22-28 Beijing & Seoul China Open, Beijing, CT Tier II $600,000 28 players - outdoor: hard Live Scores - in popup window WTA pdf: draws & OOP webcast pics: tourney - Yahoo! - WTA Beijing forecast # , # # , # Hansol Korea Open, Seoul, KOR Tier IV $145,000 32 players - outdoor: hard Live Scores - in popup window WTA pdf: draws & OOP pics: tourney - Yahoo - WTA interviews - Seoul weather # , # # , #

Beijing: 2007 - 2006 - 2005 - 2004   Shanghai: 2003   Seoul: 2007 - 2006 - 2005 - 2004 previous other tourney pages next Beijing 2007: #23 Agnes Szavay 5'7" 139lb RH 2H-BH Seoul 2007: #9 Venus Williams 6'1" 160lb RH 2H-BH

    The Beijing & Seoul draws are not yet available as of this writing (qualifying draws are usually up on the Friday before the tourney begins, main draws on Saturday, sometimes later). The links are above for your convenience when the draws become available.

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Bejing 2007:
    On Sunday in Bejing, in the final of the China Open, 18-year-old 6th-seeded # 23 Agnes Szavay from Budapest, Hungary, won the biggest victory of her career, narrowly defeating 22-year-old 2nd-seeded # 3 Jelena Jankovic of Serbia (residence: Bradenton, Florida, home of the Bollettieri Academy), 6(7)-7, 7-5, 6-2 (photo shown). The win will put Agnes, who started the season ranked just inside the top 200, into the top 20 on Monday for the first time in her career.

    Jelena trailed 0-5 in the 1st set tiebreaker before recovering to take the set. Then Jelena took a 5-1 lead in the 2nd set, and held match point with Agnes serving at 30-40, with a 1st serve fault.
    Agnes then fired a 2nd serve ace, held serve, and won the next nine games to take the 2nd set and a 3-0 lead in the 3rd.

    Agnes said: "When [Jelena] had match point, I wasn't thinking about losing the match. I was just thinking about winning that point... At the end of the match I was a little bit nervous. It can be hard to finish the match, especially when you're playing against the No.3 player in the world. But I'm happy to finish this with a title win." WTA story

    Jelena said: "When I had match point, everything happened so quickly. [Agnes] started playing so fast. I lost my focus, and as the match went on it just became worse. I broke down in the third set. I was just a different player... [Agnes is] young and has huge potential. We will be hearing a lot more from her, I'm sure."

    Agnes and Jelena had never before met on the field of combat. Agnes, who has a 54-13 match record for 2007, is now 2-1 in WTA singles finals; she won her first title earlier this year in Palermo. Jelena, who has a 70-19 match record for the year, is now 5-8 in WTA singles finals; she won the titles this year in Birmingham, Rome, Charleston, and Auckland.

Seoul 2007:
    On Sunday in Seoul, in the final of the Hansol Korea Open, 27-year-old top-seeded # 9 Venus Williams from Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, narrowly defeated 20-year-old 4th-seeded # 35 Maria Kirilenko from Moscow, Russia, 6-3, 1-6, 6-4 (photo shown). Each player won 13 games in the 2-hour, 21 minute match; Venus won 100 points, Maria won 98.

    Maria said: "In the second set I won two important games in the beginning, and [Venus] got a little bit down and started to miss. In the third set we both kept holding serve but then she broke me, and I think maybe it was bad luck for me."

    Venus said: "Sometimes in the match I was a little disappointed with the errors I was making, and it made it a lot tougher for me. But at the end, I guess in the last few games, I started to play much better...
    "I thought [Maria] played fantastic. I've never seen her play that well, and so aggressive, and not so many errors. I think that was really, really good on her part. She was just playing so well that the only choice I had was to try to play better than her." WTA story

    Venus now leads Maria 3-0 in career matches, and won both their previous meetings, which were also on hard courts, in straight sets. But Maria, who won the Kolkata title last week, has been playing much improved tennis in the latter part of this season, and gave Venus a tougher match this time. 2007 Wimbledon champ Venus is now 36-21 in WTA singles finals; Maria is 2-2 in that department.

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WTA SCOREBOARD: Beijing & Seoul s=seed, #=rank, *=upset, LL=lucky loser ranks are for the previous week How do players get into the "draw"? China Open,  Beijing, China       The time in Beijing is UCT (GMT, Zulu, Greenwich...) plus 8 hours. That is US EDT+12 hours, PDT+15 hours. China news Plan your trip Local Radar Detailed Forecast     Beijing: The main draw for Beijing has 8 seeds, with 4 1st-round byes. There are 4 qualifiers in the main draw.     Qualifying (3 rounds) starts on Saturday, qualifying finals are on Monday.     click for broader view   Beijing Int'l Tennis Centre Latitude: 39.849625 Longitude: 116.406541 goto link for World Wind China Open venue address: 50 Tiantan Rd., Chongwen District; Tel: 67142374 2007: On Sunday, Sep 16, Elena Dementieva arrived in Beijing, and impatiently waited for her mom-coach, Vera, to haul her barbells up to the penthouse so she could get right out onto the practice court... Martina Hingis arrived in Bejing three days earlier, giving her mom-coach, Melanie Molitor, more time to do the heavy lifting... 2007: On Monday, 2006 Australian Open & Wimbledon doubles champ Jie Zheng met the press, still pretty, although unable to play since May due to a bad left ankle injury... Jelena Jankovic was also looking good for reporters on Monday... On Tuesday, top players Svetlana Kuznetsova, Jelena Jankovic, Amelie Mauresmo, Elena Dementieva Lindsay Davenport, and Martina Hingis got all dressed up to be introduced to Somebody Orother (Svetlana later withdrew with an abdominal strain)...

Beijing, 1st Rd, Mon-Tue 11am, Wed 12:30pm losers' prize: $4,175 US; points: 1

Beijing, 2nd Rd, Wed-Thu 12:30pm losers' prize: $7,820 US; points: 35

Beijing, QFs, Fri 12:30pm losers' prize: $14,600 US; points: 70

Beijing, SFs, Sat 12:30pm losers' prize: $27,300 US; points: 125

Beijing, Final, Sun 7pm loser's prize: $51,000 US; points: 190 winner's prize: $95,500 US; points: 275

Beijing, Doubles Final, Sun 3pm losers' prize: $16,120 US winners' prize: $30,000 US Beijing, Qual Finals, Mon Sept 22 11am losers' prizes: q1 $640 1pt; q2 $1,195 3pts; q3 $2,230 10pts; qualifier 15 points Beijing, Withdrawals

Hansol Korea Open,  Seoul, South Korea       The time in Seoul is UCT (GMT, Zulu, Greenwich...) plus 9 hours. That is US EDT+13 hours, PDT+16 hours. Korea news Plan your trip Local Radar Detailed Forecast     Seoul: The main draw for Seoul has 8 seeds, with no 1st-round byes.     There are 4 qualifiers in the main draw. Qualifying (3 rounds) starts on Saturday, qualifying finals are on Monday.     click for broader view   Olympic Park, Seoul, Korea Latitude: 37.515143 Longitude: 127.128205 goto link for World Wind Hansol Korea Open venue address: Olympic Park, 88 Bangee-dong, Seoul 999-200, South Korea; Tel: 82 2 410 1360 2007: Among the healthy young ladies looking darned good at the Seoul players party on Wednesday night were Severine Bremond, Catalina Castano, Caroline Wozniacki & Marta Domachowska, Ai Sugiyama, Tammy Tanasugarn... ...Junri Namigata & Ayumi Morita, Maria Kirilenko, Venus Williams, Galina Voskoboeva, and Su-Wei Hsieh...

Seoul, 1st Rd, Mon-Wed 11am losers' prize: $1,035 US; points: 1

Seoul, 2nd Rd, Wed-Thu 11am losers' prize: $1,925 US; points: 15

Seoul, QFs, Fri 11am losers' prize: $3,580 US; points: 30

Seoul, SFs, Sat noon losers' prize: $6,650 US; points: 50

Seoul, Final, Sun noon loser's prize: $12,345 US); points: 80 winner's prize: $22,900 US; points: 115

Seoul, Doubles Final, Sun after singles losers' prize: $3,640 US winners' prize: $6,750 US Seoul, Qual Finals, Mon Sept 22 10am losers' prizes: q1 $175 1pt; q2 $300 2pts; q3 $555 3pts; qualifier 7 points Seoul, Withdrawals

See also: QuickShop: Sporting Goods - Martina Hingis - Anna Kournikova

Current WTA Results & Tennis News (tennis home page) - 2008 WTA Schedule with links & photos

Link to many postmatch interview & match highlight videos of WTA players at the 2008 WTA Player Videos page.

WTA PhotoRankings: the current top 20 Women's Tennis rankings with player photos, links, and bio info.