The new blue-colored clay in Madrid didn't receive a warm welcome in the tennis world and on the WTA side fifth-ranked Samantha Stosur criticized it the most referring to it as "pointless", while Serena Williams called it "ridiculous". Maria Sharapova simply uttered "unique". However, players have gathered for the tournament and on Twitter we can see that there are many positive reactions. Let's see what those with positive attitude are saying:

Kuznetsova also showed where all the clay stays: Read more »

Women's Tennis Blog is back! Sorry for this week of absence. I traveled to Brussels and I had expected I would be updating my blog, but access to the Internet was too expensive and complicated so I decided to make a short break. Anyways, there was only the Fed Cup going on over the weekend and Serbia and the Czech Republic became the finalists when Serbia defeated Russia 3-2 and the Czechs defeated Italy 4-1 in the semis. The Fed Cup final will be played in the beginning of November.

Let's see what else happened this past week:

• Kim Clijsters is still recovering from her hip injury and will skip the French Open.
• Svetlana Kuznetsova shocked with a new haircut.
• Jelena Jankovic is reportedly on a trial with coach Zeljko Krajan, who has stopped working with Dominika Cibulkova this month. Krajan is most famously known for his cooperation with Dinara Safina.
• Andrea Petkovic returned to action for the first time since Sydney, playing the Fed Cup, but lost her singles rubber to Sam Stosur.
• Caroline Wozniacki released music video for "Oxygen".
• Maria Sharapova turned 25 on April 19. Yes, just 25!

Referring to her statement in the Telegraph:

I think tennis players are actually underpaid, but I might be a little biased. I like to think we are rewarded for the hard work we put in.

Thanks for the patience, friends. From tomorrow I'll resume normal posting.

One of the greatest singers of all time, Whitney Houston, passed away at the age of 48 on February 11, and the whole world was struck, including the WTA community. Therefore, I decided to make a WTA tribute to Whitney by compiling tweets of women's tennis players mentioning the voice behind so many timeless love songs.

Serena Williams

Caroline Wozniacki

Dinara Safina

Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova

Svetlana Kuznetsova

Victoria Azarenka

Read more »

Besides doing yearly fashion retrospections for specific WTA players, Women's Tennis Blog is famous for reviewing outfits for every Grand Slam. The Australian Open is entering its second week and the time is just right for us to have a closer look at what the players are wearing. Last year Venus Williams grabbed all the attention with her EleVen designs, but the American is sadly absent this time. In 2012 the spotlight is more evenly distributed and brands such as Nike, Adidas and Fila are leading the pack.

Caroline Wozniacki’s love life is booming, at least its online representation suggests that, and her fashion designer Stella McCartney opted for the color of passion for the world No.1’s Australian Open. Wozniacki accessorized the red dress with a heart-shaped Danish flag pendant that her boyfriend Rory McIlroy gave her for Christmas.

Adidas Adizero used a shade of red for their predominantly peach dress worn by Ana Ivanovic, Daniela Hantuchova and Sorana Cirstea.

Serena Williams is wearing a blue Nike dress with wide tank straps and pleated bottom.

Read more »

In the 2011 fashion retrospections we have included major brands such as Nike (in several perspectives – on Maria Sharapova, Petra Kvitova, Serena Williams), Adidas on Daniela Hantuchova and Ana Ivanovic and on Andrea Petkovic, Lacoste on Samantha Stosur, Anta on Jelena Jankovic and Stella McCartney on Caroline Wozniacki, and now we're going to have a close look at Fila as worn by their brightest stars Kim Clijsters and Svetlana Kuznetsova.

Even though the Fila clothes themselves are not on top of my list when it comes to tennis fashion, I cannot imagine any other brand looking better on Clijsters and Kuznetsova. Therefore, I'm a huge fan of Fila and the way they nurture the vintage sporty look.

Fila doesn't experiment with ruffles, layers, glitter, dizzy patterns, etc. They like to keep designs traditionally athletic, meant primarily to cover your body so that you can play freely, without thinking whether some part of a dress would fall off (problems you would definitely face with Venus Williams' EleVen line). Read more »