ROSAMUND wrote:

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Ace Ventura wrote:

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Bencic the latest highly ranked women to withdraw from the US Open. There's talk of Suarez Navarro also pulling out - she's withdrawn from Cincy and will make a final decision on the USO in the coming days. Every withdrawal is obviously a step closer for Harriet.

I was also thinking, Heather might actually not be too far off being a seed. Crazy.

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 Some of the players who have withdrawn such as Bencic and Bertens could hardly be seen as potential winners. 

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Why not Bencic? Made the SF there last year, won Toronto P5 on hard back in the day, and either Doha/Dubai on hard last year, whichever one was the P5, so I'd say she'd have been at least a top 10 favourite, possibly shorter. Maybe not the biggest name for the US casual market, but still a bit of a blow to the average WTA fan.

 

Ace Ventura wrote:

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The Austrian event of the two has supposedly been cancelled, so that's a bit of a blow if/when officially confirmed.

apps.derstandard.at/privacywall/story/2000119300582/wta-tennisturnier-in-poertschach-abgesagt

Translated- One week after the plans for a WTA tournament in Pörtschach am Wörthersee were presented, this has now been canceled. According to the Carinthian Tennis Association, it was not possible to implement the WTA requirements in the area of Covid-19 measures in the time available. A positive event approval notification from the competent authority was also not realistic.

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 It has indeed been taken off the WTA calendar. It may also explain why Prague the same week is looking at a 128 draw, given  the two events had planned 64 players each initially... 

Ace Ventura wrote:

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ROSAMUND wrote:

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Ace Ventura wrote:

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Bencic the latest highly ranked women to withdraw from the US Open. There's talk of Suarez Navarro also pulling out - she's withdrawn from Cincy and will make a final decision on the USO in the coming days. Every withdrawal is obviously a step closer for Harriet.

I was also thinking, Heather might actually not be too far off being a seed. Crazy.

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 Some of the players who have withdrawn such as Bencic and Bertens could hardly be seen as potential winners. 

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Why not Bencic? Made the SF there last year, won Toronto P5 on hard back in the day, and either Doha/Dubai on hard last year, whichever one was the P5, so I'd say she'd have been at least a top 10 favourite, possibly shorter. Maybe not the biggest name for the US casual market, but still a bit of a blow to the average WTA fan.

 

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 I have looked up the Grand Slam records of Bencic and Bertens from the WTA media guide. Bertens has only made the 4th round of a Grand Slam on 4 occasions in 31 appearances. She's never got beyond the 3rd round in 8 appearances in the US Open. Bencic's record is better particularly in the US Open where she has  reached a semi final and a quarter final. The quarter final was in 2014.  She has reached the 4th round 5 times  in 21 Grand Slams. I know back in 2016 Liz Smylie commentating at Wimbledon said Bencic could win a Grand Slam and then she had the wrist injury. At the 2019 French Championships Jo had Bertens as a potential 3rd round opponent and Bencic as a 4th round opponent. In the actual event Bertens was ill and Donna Vekic took out Bencic very easily. That was definitely to Jo's advantage.  Jo has a better Grand Slam record than either Bertens or Bencic. At the moment I wouldn't rate Jo's chances too highly either.

flamingowings wrote:

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Bob in Spain wrote:

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Defending Champion Andreescu out of US Open

www.skysports.com/tennis/news/12110/12048759/bianca-andreescu-will-not-defend-us-open-womens-singles-title

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 Current list of women not playing USO:

• 1 Barty
• 5 Svitolina
• 6 Andreescu
• 7 Bertens
• 29 Q Wang
• 30 Pavlychenkova
• 31 Strycova
• 32 Kuznetsova
• 34 Zheng
• 38 Goerges
• 44 Ferro
• 74 Zhu
• 84 Potapova
• 92 Bogdan
• 97 Stosur
• 103 Peng
• 108 X Wang
• 115 Krejcikova

 

Andresscu isn't that surprising, I don't think she has played much since winning it!

-- Edited by flamingowings on Thursday 13th of August 2020 08:45:48 PM

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 One would think that some other players must withdraw . Adding Bencic's name that means only 3 of the top 8 are still entered. Then between players  ranked 9 and 28 everybody is still entered. Then between 29 and 38 you only have 4 players left out of 10. Then between players   ranked 39 and 115 (i.e. 77 players ) you only have 8 players missing. 

Hseih and Hercog have said they aren't going to NY, which I think takes Harriet to 6 out.

There are gaps at the top but it's still a very competitive field, and women's events are more prone to upsets in the first 3 rounds anyway. From a viewing perspective, and I'm thinking of the casual fan, I think the women's event holds up better with its "key names" like Serena and Osaka still going, most won't notice someone like Bertens missing. Whereas because the men's field is far less competitive at the top end, losing Federer and Nadal is a much bigger blow even if almost all the rest of the top 10 are there.

I think the women's event could be very interesting, and there should be far more expectations on the next generation on the men's side to actually do something here given two of the long-term roadblocks to Slam QF/SF/F have been removed.

They were never going to have Federer anyway - he was out long before anything else happened.