Jessica Pegula, the number 1 female tennis ranking with a free hit of the Clay Court Wins

Welcome again to the tennis briefing on Monday, where Athletic He will explain the stories behind last week’s stories in court.

This week, the most Mercurial player on the male tour did what he did best, there was an American Shuffle at the summit of the female ranking, and a Wimbledon champion quarter of the quarter of tennis planning revealed the sensitive balance of tennis planning.

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An important milestone for Jessica Pegula?

Jessica Pegula won the WTA 500 title in Charleston, while in front of Coco Gauff, the American trio just below the peak of the female tennis ranking. After coming from 1-5 in the second set, Pegula defeated Sofia Kenin 6-3, 7-5, and now the world number 3 is matched with career height.

American and World No. 2 A great gap between IgA świątek and Gauff and the World No. 5 With another big gap between Madison Keys, Pegula’s first clay-mahkeme title is 3 and the World No. It may seem more important than the tight turmoil between the world in 4, only 38 points separate them.

However, Pegula kidnapped last year’s Clay-Court release with disability, now entering 1,000 WTA in Rome and Madrid, and then in Paris, the French Open has made an effective free kick for the next few months. Aryna Sabalenka, who has the highest number of wins on the WTA tour this season, will enter the surface passage in front of it.

With more than 1,200 points and 4,195, Gauff could climb higher on red dirt with the defense of Kancada świątek.

James Hansen

Who can explain the mystery of Botic Van de Zandschulp?

Is there a more interesting player in the ATP tour than this Dutch?

Mercurial Van de Zandschulp became an unexpected tennis master and won when he was in order to lose, and he was torn apart when there was no reason.

Van de Zandschulp defeated Carlos Alcaraz in the US Open on the flat sets, finished Rafael Nadal’s career with a Davis cup in Spain and defeated Novak Djokovic (including 6-1) in Indian Wells in the last eight months. All these gains were obtained by a remarkable nerve tremor for a player who had a sprained story of sprains under pressure. In the 2023 Munich Open final, he served three times against Holger Rune and filed four championship points, but lost.

More than a year, after a while, in May 2024, Van de Zandschulp said that he was so disappointed with the tennis he was considering to retire. Instead, some of the three best players at the last date defeated some of the biggest stages of the sport, remained calm under pressure as if he was hitting a local club.

Well, Van de Zandschulp would receive a lowest step-how fee in the first round of Bucharest Open ATP 250 against the 38-year-old French French French Richard Gasquet, who will retire after the French deficit this year?

He took a set and two breaks and had a match score for 6-4, 6-4 wins. But he kidnapped and lost 6-1 in the decision, looked as neutral as he did to beat some of the best to do it.

Charlie EcCleshare

How did American male players reach a milestone in Houston?

Easily, Alex Michelsen won three sets of victory against French veteran Adrian Mannarino to reach the Houston Open Quarter finals. Michelsen made a remarkable moment on his own, but with his victory on April 3, eight of the quarter -finalists were Americans. In 1991, Orlando, Fla.

Andre Agassi won the tournament, while Pete Sampras lost in the semifinals. These two, plus Jim Courier, soon began to dominate the sport. Will the Houston 2025 graduates do something similar?

This sounds like a big stretch, but a 20 -year -old California Michelsen has one of this year’s breaking stars. Reaching the fourth round of Australia Open, Michelsen has a few hundred ranking points and a bright future, except the first 30 of the world.

Frances Tiafoe and Tommy Paul, one of the other quarter -finalists, are at the top 20 regularly, while 22 -year -old Colton Smith, 23 -year -old Brandon Nakashima and 26 -year -old Aleksandar Kovacevic Tennis Food Chain. 28 -year -old Christopher Eubanks could not start after his breakthrough in 2023.

24 -year -old Jenson Brooksby started the week as the farthest of 507, and rebuilt his ranking after the doping ban. During the qualifying, he won five match points and the main lottery matches on the way to the final, passed Tiafoe for the first round championship, and 335 places rose in the ranking in this process.

American tennis fans hopes that the event will offer a jump board for the Season of the Clay Court for at least one of these eight quarters of the finalist.

Charlie EcCleshare

What is the price of national pride?

Billie Jean King Cup takes the stage at the center of women’s tennis between April 10 – April 13 and the last elimination tour for the international team event. Two of them-planned-planned-świątek and Britain’s Emma Raducanu-Both of them stated that they would not represent their countries last week, stating the need to benefit from a week.

2022 Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina, representing Kazakhstan for representing Russia, will travel to Melbourne to represent the country against Australia and Colombia. In 2017, he became a citizen of Kazakhstan in exchange for financial support from the tennis federation of the country, which has been designed to turn a country with a billionaire businessman and philanthropist Bulat Uteratov since 2007 into a country with a pre-vard tennis infrastructure.

For Rybakina, this means a trip to Australia – and Stuttgart, which began on April 14, kidnaps the WTA 500 in Germany. If other players perform well, they may fall more. If Kazakhstan passes, it may be less important – but a good show of pushing and withdrawing of the tennis competition.

James Hansen

Shooting of the week

Or maybe the moon, maybe even years from Ryan Seggerman in Houston.

Incredible 🤯

Ryan Seggerman with the shooting of the year!#Usclay | @Tennistv pic.twitter.com/vaxfknayye

– Fayez Sarofim & Co. US Clay (@Mensclaycourt) April 5, 2025

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🏆 Winners of the week

🎾 ATP:

🏆 Flavio Cobolli (3) def. Sebastian Baez (1) To earn 6-4, 6-4 Tiriac Open (250) Bucharest, Romania. Italian’s first ATP tour title.
🏆 Luciano Dardament (7) def. Tallon Griekspoor (1) 7-6 (3), 7-6 (4) to win Hassan Grand Prix II (250) Morrakech is in Morroco. Italian’s second ATP tour title.
🏆 Jenson Brooksby (Q) def. Frances Tiafoe (2) To win 6-4, 6-2 US Men’s Clay Court Championship (250) in Houston. American’s first ATP tour title.

🎾 WTA:

🏆 Jessica Pegula (1) def. Sofia Kenin To earn 6-3, 7-5 Charleston is open (500) Charleston is WTA Tour title of American’s first clay court on SC.
🏆 Camila Osorio (2) def. QUARZYNA KAWA (Q) To earn 6-3, 6-3 Copa Colsanitas (250) Bogotá, in Colombia. Osorio now won the event three times.

📈📉 On the rise / down

📈 Jessica Pegula After his victory in South Carolina, he raised from number to 3 to 3.
📈 Jenson Brooksby After his win in Texas, 335 points rose from 507 to 172.
📈 Sofia Kenin After increasing 10 points from 44 to 34, enter the first 40.

📉 Matteo Berrettini He falls from number 27 to 34 places and gives up the first 32 points to see that he has seeded him in big events.
📉 Maria Sakkari It leaves 18 places from 64 to 82.
📉 Fabio Fognini It rounds 14 points from 99 to 113.

📅 Appearance

🎾 ATP

📍 Monte Carlo, Monaco: Monte Carlo Masters (1,000) Alexander Zverev, Carlos Alcaraz, Novak Djokovic, Jack Draper.

📺 UK: Sky Sports; USA: Tennis Canal 💻 Tennis TV

🎾 ITF

📍 ‘ Billie Jean King Cup Qualification Elena Rybakina, Victoria Mboko, Elina Svitolina, Danielle Collins.

📺 UK: Sky Sports; WE: Tennis Channel

Tell us what you notice this week in the comments below while men and women’s tours continue.

(Best Photo: Matthew Stockman / Getty Images; Design: For Eamonn Dalton Athletic)