Wickmayer (unfairly) forced to qualify
>> Monday, January 11, 2010
Yanina Wickmayer of Belgium, though ranked #16, is joining the qualifying tournament in the year's opening Grand Slam – the 2010 Australian Open. Despite winning a WTA international level tournament at Auckland, New Zealand last week – a tournament that had five top 20 players in the draw, Wickmayer is paying a consequence for failing to follow the so-called "whereabouts" rule that requires players to inform drug-testing officials of their whereabouts over periods of three months.
Wickmayer was given a one-year suspension by the Flemish Anti-doping Tribunal in Belgium that was eventually overturned when she appealed. However, the decision to overturn the suspension came on December 14, a week after the December 7 deadline for the Australian Open 2010 entry date. Wickmayer requested for one of the wildcards into the women's singles main draw but her request was turned down by tournament organizers.
The Australian Open awards eight wildcards into the main draw. Two of these are reciprocal wildcard entries given to the US and French tennis federations. One slot is provided to the top ranked player from Asia that does not qualify into the main draw. The rest are awarded at the discretion of tournament organizers. Wickmayer's compatriot, former #1 Justine Henin received one of these wild cards when she announced her "un-retirement" in October 2009.
As a tennis fan who doesn't agree on the suspension dealt to Wickmayer, I hope that she wins all three of her qualifying matches. I believe that she will, especially since she beat a quality field that included world #12 Flavia Pennetta on her way to winning the Auckland tournament. The irony is – all players that she beat in that tournament are ranked high enough to gain entry into the main draw. And, she beat them all in straight sets. In the qualifying tournament, she probably will not face a player ranked within 100 places of her ranking, but that is not a guarantee that she will win all those matches. Even #1-ranked players have fallen to other players ranked below the top 100 in Grand Slam matches (Martina Hingis's first round loss to Jelena Dokic at Wimbledon comes to mind).
If she does win all three of her qualifying matches, it is still unclear to me whether or not she will be issued the #16 seed. I think that she will not since the lists of seeds are normally announced before the end of the qualifying tournament. That would make her and Henin the two most dangerous floaters in the women's draw.
To date, only one wild card slot remains un-announced. Organizers had previously indicated that all the remaining wildcards will be given to Australian players who are not ranked high enough to enter the main draw. While awarding wildcards are at their discretion, it would have made sense had they simply awarded a wildcard slot to Wickmayer after she won the Auckland event. After all, she is ranked in the top 20, a recent Grand Slam semifinalist, and one of the young, rising stars in the women's tour. No way should she be overlooked in favor of some 200+ ranked junior Aussie junior player who would have benefited from joining the qualifying tournament and would most likely go down in straight sets in the first round anyway.
Not providing Wickmayer the wildcard may come back to haunt the organizers – imagine the scenario that Wickmayer does qualify and then faces Sam Stosur, Jelena Dokic, or Alicia Molik in the early rounds of the tournament. It would be good if an Aussie wins the match, but if not, it would be some sort of poetic justice if Wickmayer wins that and she goes on to replicate or better her US Open semifinal showing.
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