WTA June 7-13: Birmingham AEGON Classic Birmingham, GBR Edgbaston Priory Club INTL $220,000 56m/32q/16d outdoor: grass Live Scores draws: qual - main - doub - OOP draws: WTA pics: Y!: sports     news BC - news ED | WTA Birmingham: radar - forecast # # # # # # # # # # # #

Tourney pages: Birmingham: 2009 - 2008 - 2007 - 2006 - 2005 - 2004 - 2003 previous other tourney pages next Birmingham 2009: #25 Na Li 5'7¾" 137lb RH 2H-BH Birmingham 2009: #53 Magdalena Rybarikova 5'11" 143lb RH 2H-BH

    The Birmingham 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.

    The 4-week chlorophyll court season begins this week at Birmingham, followed by Eastbourne and s'Hertengobosch next week, and then the Wimbledon fortnight.

    Birmingham is the tourney that may have the lowest total prize $ to # of players ratio of the WTA Tour. The 56 players in the main draw (and 24 more who lost in qualifying) are there to get some time in playing on grass to prepare for Wimbledon, more than for the $220,000 prize money. Next week at Eastbourne, the last week before Wimbledon, there will be about half as many players, and almost 3 times as much prize money.

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  Birmingham, 2009:

    On Sunday in Birmingham, England, in the final of the AEGON Classic, 20-year-old 13th-seeded #53 Magdalena Rybarikova from Bratislava, Slovakia, won her first WTA singles title by defeating 27-year-old 4th-seeded # 25 Na Li from Wuhan, Hubei, China, 6-0, 7-6(2) (Na is shown during the match, Magdalena is shown making friends with the Maude Watson Trophy afterward).

    Magdalena's prize is $37,000; Na's is $19,000.

    2006 Wimbledon Juniors runner-up Magdalena said: "It's a great feeling, it's definitely the best moment of my career... I was okay to start with, and then in the second set I got very nervous. But now it's absolutely great. It's a dream...
    "I've always liked grass. I have a good serve, forehand and volley—I think it's my best surface."
    mp3 audio 1 - mp3 audio 2 - BBC story - WTA story

    Na said: "I was missing a lot today. It was much different than my match yesterday [defeating Maria Sharapova for the first time]. Yesterday was such a big win for me. I was still thinking about that and not thinking enough about today. [Magdalena] played really well though."

    Magda and Na had never before met on the field of combat.

    Magdalena is now 1-0 in WTA singles finals; she has won 4 ITF singles titles and 1 ITF doubles title. Magdalena has a 16-13 match record this season, and is 6-0 on grass courts.

    Na is now 2-4 in WTA singles finals; she won her titles at Gold Coast last year and at Guangzhou in 2004. Na is 22-10 in matches this year.

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WTA SCOREBOARD: Birmingham s=seed, #=rank, *=upset, LL=lucky loser ranks are for the previous week How do players get into the "draw"? AEGON Classic,  Birmingham, England   tourney time:        = GMT +1 hour        = US EDT +5 hours        = US PDT +8 hours England News - UK News Weather Forecast | Weather Maps | Weather Radar     Birmingham: The main draw for Birmingham has 16 seeds, with 8 1st-round byes. There are 8 qualifiers and 5 wild cards in the main draw. Qualifying finals are on Sunday.   click for broader view   Edgbaston Priory Club Latitude: 52.458128 Longitude: -1.91263 goto link for World Wind DFS Classic venue address: The Edgbaston Priory Club, Sir Harrys Road, Birmingham, England 2009: On Saturday, June 6, at Birmingham, 2004 and 2005 tourney champion (and 2007 finalist) Maria Sharapova told members of the media that her right shoulder is indeed hunky-dory and that she is ready and rarin' to go...

Birmingham, 1st Round, Mon-Tue 11am loser's prize: $700 US; points: 1

Birmingham, 2nd Round, Tue-Wed 11am loser's prize: $1,350 US; points: 15

Birmingham, 3rd Round, Thu 11am loser's prize: $2,600 US; points: 30

Birmingham, QFs, Fri 11am loser's prize: $5,000 US; points: 70

Birmingham, SFs, Sat noon loser's prize: $10,000 US; points: 130

Birmingham, Final, Sun noon loser's prize: $19,000 US; points: 200 winner's prize: $37,000 US; points: 280

Birmingham, Doubles Final, Sun after singles loser's prize: $5,800 winner's prize: $11,000 Birmingham, Qualifying Finals, Sun Jun 6 losers' prizes: q1 $190 1pt; q2 $360 6 pts; qualifier 10 points Birmingham, Withdrawals

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

Current WTA Results & Tennis News (tennis home page) - 2010 WTA Schedule with links & photos

Link to many postmatch interview & match highlight videos of WTA players at the 2009 WTA Player Videos page.

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