The women’s tournament at Wimbledon begins Monday. Serena Williams tries to defend her championship from 2015 and, in the process, tie Steffi Graf on the all-time singles title list with 22 trophies. She has some momentum, but three other players have momentum of their own. Let’s give a look at some of the more confident players in the women’s field.
Serena Williams
There is an undeniable reality that Serena has not yet won a major tournament this year, but she has been the best player at the majors this year nonetheless. Serena has made each of the first two major finals this year, while Angelique Kerber – the winner of the Australian Open – lost in the first round of the French Open. Garbine Muguruza, who won the French Open, crashed out of the Australian Open in round three, failing to make it safely through the first week. Serena has no major titles, but she’s been more consistent than any of her peers. Not only is Serena the only player who has made both Grand Slam finals this year; she’s the only one who has made the semifinals or better at the two majors. Johanna Konta and Agnieszka Radwanska (Australian Open) and Kiki Bertens and Samantha Stosur (French Open) came nowhere close to the semifinals at the other Grand Slam event they played in this season.
Serena is a confident player who is playing well. She just needs an extra ounce of luck, maybe health, to win this Wimbledon title.
Garbine Muguruza
The critics will say that Muguruza lost in the first round of the Mallorca Open, the grass warm-up event for Wimbledon held in Muguruza’s home nation of Spain. That could be cited as evidence that Muguruza doesn’t have momentum. However, Muguruza was still enjoying her French Open championship and was still processing the magnitude of winning her first Grand Slam tournament. If ever a result could be understood, that was it. Muguruza enters Wimbledon as a reigning champion of a prestigious tournament, not as the loser of the Mallorca Open. Muguruza made the Wimbledon final last year, so she knows she can play well on grass, anyway. She will enter the All-England Club with total belief and trust in her game.
Kiki Bertens
The French Open semifinalist had a few weeks in which to heal from a calf injury which limited her movement against Serena in Paris. Had she been able to move freely, she probably would have won that match. As it is, Bertens is becoming a legitimately tough player. She played Serena in a close match at the U.S. Open last year in New York. She has steadily been moving up the ladder in women’s tennis. She has won a lot of matches this season and is learning how to back up one good match with another the very next day. She is optimistic heading into Wimbledon and she should be a player that makes some noise. She’s still not a household name, so you should find some good betting value on her in the early rounds at Wimbledon.
Monica Puig
This is a dangerous floater in the draw, a player many in the WTA do not want to face. Puig strung together several high-quality performances this past week in Eastbourne, running all the way to the semifinals before losing to Dominika Cibulkova. She is taking the ball early and is taking away time from her opponents. She is getting a rhythm from the baseline and is building back her career after a rough 2015 season.
What’s interesting is that she is not always great on grass but she has been phenomenal on the surface this season. She is just 18-13 overall on grass but that includes her sparkling 10-3 record on the lawn this season. That means that before 2016, she was just 8-10 on grass. Even so, as we saw with Garbine Muguruza, you can’t discount moment. Does she look like a player who can win it all? Probably not. But don’t be surprised if she makes a deep run at Wimbledon given how she has been performing recently.
