Omair has been a regular contributor on Women's Tennis Blog, but now he has his own website and in the days leading up to the Australian Open he employed his love of stats to predict how Top 8 seeds will perform at the first Grand Slam of the season.

Omair's position in the articles is purely statistical, as he evaluated players' chances based on the past performance of players having the same seeding and based on the previous Australian Open results of the respective players. It's nice to see a statistical aspect, but you know that much more plays a part in whether a player will succeed, like who is in their section of the draw, possible injuries, mental preparation, etc.

Nevertheless, let's see the statistical analysis for each of our Top 8 stars:

• Victoria Azarenka and Australian Open 2013 - No.1 seed
• Maria Sharapova and Australian Open 2013 - No.2 seed
• Serena Williams and Australian Open 2013 - No.3 seed
• Agnieszka Radwanska and Australian Open 2013 - No.4 seed
• Angelique Kerber and Australian Open 2013 - No.5 seed
• Li Na and Australian Open 2013 - No.6 seed
• Sara Errani and Australian Open 2013 - No.7 seed
• Petra Kvitova and Australian Open 2013 - No.8 seed

Great work, Omair! I know you poured in a lot of your free time in these articles!

Subsequent addition: Check out Omair's analysis of the women's singles draw.

Agnieszka Radwanska and Li Na both entered the Premier-level Sydney semifinal with perfect win-loss records this season, owing to their title runs in Auckland (Radwanska) and inaugural Shenzhen (Li), but the higher-ranked Pole spoiled Li's undefeated run, even though it was Li who had led their head-to-head 5-3, including 3-1 last season.

Li battled hard in her last night's match against qualifier Madison Keys and today she saved seven match points before finally succumbing to tiredness and the top-seeded Radwanska, who was leading the encounter throughout.

On a better note for Li, the WTA has announced that the big Tokyo tournament that will celebrate its 30th anniversary this year will be replaced by an event in Li's hometown of Wuhan in China in 2014. The tournament will have the prize money of about $2 million.

The other semifinal was between Dominika Cibulkova and second seed Angelique Kerber and Cibulkova prevailed 6-2 4-6 6-3. Even though Cibulkova entered the match with a 2-0 record against Kerber, both those victories happened before Kerber made it big in the tennis world and Kerber was favored for appearance in the Sydney final.

Radwanska has now won eight matches in a row and is 3-0 against Cibulkova, but the peers haven't faced each other in years, precisely, since 2008! (photos: Ralf Reinecke)

Top four seeds were the only seeds in the Apia International Sydney quarterfinals and three of them advanced to the semis – No.1 Agnieszka Radwanska, No.2 Angelique Kerber and No.4 Li Na, while No.3 Sara Errani got eliminated in a dominant fashion.

The world No.4 Agnieszka Radwanska extended her win-loss record this season to 7-0 by rallying from 3-1 down in the second set to battle past Roberta Vinci 6-4 7-5. It was a nice revenge for Radwanska for the loss in their last meeting which saw Roberta Vinci reach her first Grand Slam quarterfinal at the 2012 US Open. In the other quarterfinal played during the day session, Dominika Cibulkova continued her running through the draw, adding the sixteenth to her fifteenth Top 10 win, that happened in the first round against Petra Kvitova, by dominating Sara Errani 6-2 6-1. Read more »

Last year our great contributor John Bolan merged his courage and talent for tennis predictions and shared with us as early as in January how he thought the season-ending WTA Top 10 would look like. And that wasn't all. He asked you to join him in predictions and James, the reader who turned out to be the best predictor, was awarded an autograph of a WTA star.

John Bolan receiving autograph of Victoria Azarenka

As we all enjoyed the little project, we decided to repeat it this year. John has made his 2013 predictions (I have to say that he sent me the finished article way before New Year's Eve and before the WTA action started, but I was a bit slow in putting it up together!), and you are more than welcome to comment on John's picks, to share your own Top 10 selection in the comments below this article and then we get to wait for the season to finish to see how we all fared. The best predictor will win an autograph of a Top 10 WTA player, so there's even an incentive to take some time and employ your foretelling skills! Now I'm giving the word to John!

It isn't easy to predict the Top 10 players for 2013 this early, but these are my choices for the end of 2013:

1. Maria Sharapova
2. Victoria Azarenka
3. Agnieszka Radwanska
4. Serena Williams
5. Li Na
6. Caroline Wozniacki
7. Samantha Stosur
8. Petra Kvitova
9. Sara Errani
10. Angelique Kerber

I have tried my best to keep personal preferences out of my thoughts while choosing these players. Instead, I checked out the most recent head-to-head matches, the number of tournaments played the past two years and injury reports. Injuries always have a big effect on the outcome of the Top 10. Vera Zvonareva and Andrea Petkovic are not included because they remain out of action and will not play in Australia this year. Read more »

In January this year, Women's Tennis Blog's faithful contributor John Bolan was brave enough to share with the world his predictions about the 2012 year-end ranking and asked you to join him in foretelling the WTA standings, offering the best predictor among you one Top 10 WTA player autograph. Isn't it exciting to see now how John and about 30 of you who joined did?

John was absolutely correct in placing two players – John's No.1 Victoria Azarenka and No.2 Maria Sharapova have finished No.1 and No.2. He misplaced Serena Williams by just one spot, Li Na by two, Petra Kvitova and Agnieszka Radwanska by three and Caroline Wozniacki by four.

Three of John's Top 10 players didn't make the cut. Kim Clijsters was John's No.3, but in the middle of the year she decided to retire and actualized the decision after the US Open, while injuries pushed John's No.8 Vera Zvonareva and No.10 Sabine Lisicki to No.96 and No.37 respectively. Year-end No.5 Angelique Kerber and No.6 Sara Errani are the biggest top surprises of the season. Let's give the word to John!

I'm thrilled with the outcome since seven of the predicted players finished as final Top 10 players. The fact that my first two picks were exactly correct is a feat I have not been able to do in previous years. The fans using the comment section to submit their own picks also did better than in 2011.

Injuries were once again the biggest issue for great players not finishing in the Top 10. Kim Clijsters, Vera Zvonareva, Sabine Lisicki, Venus Williams and Andrea Petkovic were casualties during 2012. The hardest part of picking the Top 10 is the big unknown of which players will not be able to compete for the entire season. Read more »