This season Li Na became the first Asian to win a Grand Slam, at the Australian Open she became the first Asian Grand Slam finalist, the Chinese 29-year-old also equaled the highest ranking ever for an Asian player in June and now she became the first player from her country to qualify for the $4,900,000 season-ending Championships, which will be held in Istanbul, Turkey, October 25-30.

Three more berths in the singles field are left in Istanbul, as Caroline Wozniacki, Maria Sharapova, Petra Kvitova and Victoria Azarenka have already qualified. Azarenka, the second seed at this week’s China Open, retired from the tournament in the third round against Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova with right foot injury. (photo: © Neal Trousdale)

The second edition of the $600,000 Commonwealth Bank Tournament of Champions in Bali, the last tournament of the WTA season, will feature up-and-coming stars, but also established players including Grand Slam champion Ana Ivanovic.

To qualify for Bali and its tropical fun a player had to win an International-level event during the season and be one of the six highest-ranked players who did not qualify for the WTA Championships.

Here’s the 2010 Bali field, including one International-level title a player has won in 2010:

Li Na – Birmingham
Aravane Rezai – Bastad (won the Bali title last year with Marion Bartoli retiring in tears after losing the first set 7-5 in the final)
Yanina Wickmayer – Auckland
Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova - Monterrey
Ana Ivanovic – Linz
Alisa Kleybanova - Kuala Lumpur
Daniela Hantuchova (wildcard)
Kimiko Date Krumm (wildcard)

This year there will be no round-robin format at Bali and thus all the players have received a bye in the first round. Li, Date Krumm, Pavlyuchenkova and Ivanovic are in the top half of the draw, Hantuchova, Wickmayer, Kleybanova and Rezai are in the bottom half.

What do you think of the Bali tournament being scheduled to take place after the WTA Championships? Wouldn't it be better to finalize the season with the WTA Championships? I feel that the new Commonwealth Bank Tournament of Champions is decreasing the feeling of the elite and grand ending to the season that the WTA Championships are bringing. (photos via Commonwealth Bank Tournament of Champions)

Elena Dementieva shocked the tennis world by leaving the sport without any prior notice, during the WTA Championships – Doha 2010. We have already shared with you some of the reasons behind Dementieva's decision, and I'm sure you would like more information about her future plans.

First of all, when Dementieva said she was ready for a big change in her life, yes, she was thinking about having babies. When asked about plans to have children, Dementieva said: "I hope so, yeah."

Also, you may have wondered how Dementieva will spend her time now that there is no travel and tennis in her life. The answer is that she will focus on her studies which she started last year at one of the best universities in Moscow. However, she will surely miss playing tennis and will follow the tournaments and congratulate players on their successes.

And of course, you may have wondered how Dementieva feels about not adding a Grand Slam title to her fruitful career. Well, she's not preoccupied with it, because she always gave the very best of herself – "You don't have to be perfect, but you have to try hard. And I did all the time." (source: WTA Tour, photo: © Neal Trousdale)

Doubles team of Gisela Dulko and Flavia Pennetta crowned their stellar season with their biggest career title, the WTA Championships – Doha 2010. They defeated second seeds Kveta Peschke and Katarina Srebotnik 7-5 6-4 in Sunday’s final and won the prestigious season-ending title playing at the tournament for the very first time.

The top-seeded pairing of Dulko and Pennetta came to Doha with six 2010 doubles titles (Miami, Stuttgart, Rome, Bastad, Montreal, Moscow) and what better way to finish the season than by becoming the year-end No.1 team on the WTA and winning the WTA Championships title. On top of that, Argentina's Dulko will rise to No.1 in the individual doubles rankings and become just the second South American ever to achieve that feat. (photo: sr_cranks)

Just as Jay from www.OnCourtAdvantage.com previewed here on Women's Tennis Blog, the WTA Championships final featured the battle between Kim Clijsters and Caroline Wozniacki, and it was a three-setter, however, the winner turned out to be Kim Clijsters and not Caroline Wozniacki.

It was only the second meeting between Clijsters and Wozniacki, and just like their first match which happened in the final of the 2009 US Open, this one was in the final of another grand tournament for which only the best of the best qualify. The 20-year-old Wozniacki, the youngest player to reach the WTA Championships final since Maria Sharapova won at 17 in 2004, rose to the occasion and gave great resistance to the still much more experienced Clijsters.

The Belgian three-time US Open champion won the first set 6-3 and raced to a 4-1 lead in the second set. Wozniacki took charge from that moment on and leveled the score at 4-4, before taking the second set 7-5. In the decider, Clijsters made a crucial break in the sixth game to establish a 4-2 lead and Wozniacki was never able to neutralize that Clijsters’ advantage. The Dane had chances to stay in the match in the eighth game of the third set, but didn’t make good use of them and Clijsters won the match shortly after, on her second match point. Final score: 6-3 5-7 6-3.

The 27-year-old Clijsters became the fifth player to win the WTA Championships at least three times (she won back-to-back titles in 2002 and 2003), after Navratilova (8), Graf (5), Evert (4) and Seles (3). It’s her 40th career title and fifth this season. The world No.4 added a huge sum of $1,450,000 to the already great $3,585,060 she had won prior to Doha in 2010 only. As for the money Wozniacki is taking home, she is sure not disappointed despite the loss – her runner-up check is worth $680,000.

It’s bad for top-seeded Wozniacki that she didn’t have that extra something to defeat a player of Clijsters’ caliber and go all the way to the prestigious Doha title which would be a nice icing on the cake of her season-ending No.1 ranking.  Good news is that she reached the title match, fought well against Clijsters, even had comeback periods during the match, and above all, she was far from melting down and letting the nerves get the better of her.

Here's more retirement news, but unlike Elena Dementieva, Kim Clijsters is giving us two years to prepare. The 27-year-old Belgian, whose post-baby career has been more than successful, said to the Guardian that she is planning to leave tennis once again in order to have a second child.

We do want to have more children… I'd like to try and keep the tennis going until the Olympics in London, at which point Jada will be obligated to go to school. So that's when I'll probably be calling it quits and just focus on the family.

Besides focusing on family, Clijsters plans to be active at the tennis club she bought in her home Belgium.

Together with a friend of mine, I've bought a tennis club in Belgium — actually the club where I practice at in Bree. We're going through the process of rebuilding it, so when I retire from tennis, that's something that will interest me very much.

Since giving birth to incredibly cute daughter Jada and returning to tennis in 2009, Clijsters has won two US Open titles, and another three tournaments in 2010 – Brisbane, Miami, Cincinnati. The Belgian has qualified for Doha and has just as I’m writing this defeated Samantha Stosur 7-6(3) 6-1 at the season-ending WTA Championships to reach nothing less than the final. (source: Tennis.com, (photo: Twenty90seven)

WTA players seem to enjoy catching us unprepared. It’s not a shocker that Elena Dementieva decided to call it a career, but at this very moment, without any prior notice, it’s nothing less than a shocker. The graceful Russian knew she was about to retire even in the beginning of the season, but didn’t want to make her decision public so that people wouldn’t talk about it during the whole year. That’s so Elena. She’s so humble and never wants to draw spotlight to herself.

Still, it's very tough decision to make.  Very emotional.  I made the decision in the beginning of this season, so it was very hard coming to the tournaments knowing that this was my last one.  It was very emotional for me to play the whole year.

I didn't want to make it public.  I didn't want everybody talking about the whole season. You know, I only told to my family and close friends, so today in the court I was very surprised that everyone kind of knew about my secret.  They all were standing, and it was very special for me.

The 29-year-old Dementieva was ranked inside the Top 20 for 524 of 529 weeks since September 11, 2000. That’s ten years! She’s currently ranked ninth, and 328 of her career weeks she spent inside the Top 10. Read more »

It's been a never-ending debate about the way the WTA ranking system functions, whether it is flawed, whether a player who hasn't won a Grand Slam should be ranked No.1, etc. Our faithful contributor John Bolan belongs to the group of those who strongly believe that Caroline Wozniacki deserves her top ranking, despite not having won a major, and below is the justification of his opinion.

The topic is more than relevant now when Wozniacki has clinched the No.1 season-ending ranking, by beating French Open champion Francesca Schiavone 3-6 6-1 6-1 at the WTA Championships to qualify for the semifinals alongside Vera Zvonareva, Kim Clijsters and Samantha Stosur.

The WTA’s ranking system favors the majors where the winner is awarded 2,000 ranking points. A few other tournaments award 1,000 points to the winner, but most award only 280 points to the winner. The mathematics works out that a player would need to win 8 of these regular tournaments to equal just one victory in a major. My personal opinion is that the WTA system is flawed and more points and money should be offered in the regular tournaments and less in the majors. If they would change their system, more good players would play in more tournaments. That is, if they want to be ranked number one or in the top ten.

Players like Kim Clijsters, Justine Henin, Venus Williams, and Serena Williams can choose to play a few tournaments each year and add some excitement to the game. But players who play a limited schedule should not expect to be ranked the same as a player who plays the entire tour. In my opinion, the WTA should be marketing its stars like Caroline Wozniacki, Victoria Azarenka and others who play a full schedule and are highly ranked. Read more »