At the previous Grand Slam, the 2012 US Open, Laura Robson made it to the fourth round by upsetting Li Na and Kim Clijsters on the way, and now she's through to the third round of the Australian Open, having taken out Wimbledon champion and eighth seed Petra Kvitova 2-6 6-3 11-9 in a match that finished after midnight local time.

Kvitova finished the match in which, according to her own words, her serve was worse than ever, and 18 double faults surely confirm the Czech's resentment at herself, although 18 aces did provide a good counter-balance. In the third set Kvitova built a 3-0 lead, playing the best tennis of the match, but the 18-year-old Robson then broke her three times to go up 6-5. Kvitova broke back again and a few upcoming games went with serve until Robson again took her opponent's serve and held to love to advance to the third round of a Grand Slam for the second time in her career.

The new face of Adidas by Stella McCartney next plays Sloane Stephens for a chance to avenge her last week's Hobart loss to the American 19-year-old. It's been their only career meeting so far. (photo: © Neal Trousdale)

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.

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 »

After falling in the second round of the Brisbane International, Petra Kvitova won just two games against Dominika Cibulkova in the first round of the Apia International Sydney, 6-1 6-1. Cibulkova is always a threat and she is a deserving world No.15, but these two early losses of the eighth-ranked Kvitova do put a big question mark above her fans' heads. In the defeat to Cibulkova, Kvitova recorded 35 unforced errors. After the match, when asked what went wrong, Kvitova said that everything went wrong and that she played very badly.

Did Kvitova enter the slump zone or is this just a phase she'll get out of in time? Last year she played the Sydney semifinals and followed up with a semifinal at the Australian Open.

Caroline Wozniacki also opened the season with a shock loss, to Ksenia Pervak in the first round of Brisbane, but in Sydney she recorded a comfortable 6-2 6-1 victory over Urszula Radwanska in the opening round. The freshly-engaged Maria Kirilenko is also through, with a 7-5 6-2 win over Olivia Rogowska. (via Women Who Serve and WTA Tour, photo: © Neal Trousdale)

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 »