King and Shvedova Complete Doubles Field at TEB BNP Paribas WTA Championships-Istanbul

Written by: Staff on 16th October 2011

King and Shvedova Complete Doubles Field at TEB BNP Paribas WTA Championships-Istanbul

Vania King of the US hits a return to Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark during their third round match on the sixth day of the 2011 US Open Tennis Championship at the USTA National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows, New York, USA 03 September 2011. The US Open runs through 11 September 2011. EPA/JUSTIN LANE |

The Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) today announced that the doubles team of Vania King and Yaroslava Shvedova has secured the final spot in the field of the prestigious TEB BNP Paribas WTA Championships, to be hosted at the state of the art Sinan Erdem Arena in Istanbul, Turkey from October 25-30, 2011.

King/Shvedova complete the doubles field that features Kveta Peschke/Katarina Srebotnik, Liezel Huber/Lisa Raymond and Gisela Dulko/Flavia Pennetta.

The WTA’s year-end finale, to be held in Istanbul through 2013, will feature the world’s top eight singles players and top four doubles teams competing for the coveted title and a share of the $5 million in prize money.

“I’d like to congratulate Vania and Yaroslava on qualifying for the TEB BNP Paribas WTA Championships. They came very close to winning their third Grand Slam doubles title at the US Open, and it will be great to see them back at the Championships for the second successive year, ” said Stacey Allaster, Chairman and CEO of the WTA.

“We are very excited and proud to be going to the Championships for the second time. We didn’t think at the beginning of the year that we would be in this position but we’ve had a very solid season and hopefully cemented ourselves at the top. We know that we still have to work hard and improve and hope that we can go far in the Championships,” said Vania King.

King and Shvedova return to the year-end Championships for the second successive year and will look to improve on last year’s semifinal result. The pair fell just short of winning their third Grand Slam doubles title at the US Open, losing in a third set tiebreak to Liezel Huber/Lisa Raymond in the final. They won their third title as a team at the Western & Southern Open (Cincinnati), were runners-up at the Internazionali BNL d’Italia (Rome) and the HP Japan Women’s Open (Osaka), and made semifinals at Roland Garros, the Toray Pan Pacific Open (Tokyo) and the China Open.

The singles competition at the TEB BNP Paribas WTA Championships features eight players and begins as a round robin event, with players divided into two groups of four. Over the first four days of competition, each player meets the other three players in their group, with the top two in each pool moving on to the semifinals. The first-placed player in one group meets the second-placed player in the other group, and vice versa. The winners of each semifinal meet in the championship match. The doubles event features four teams and is a single elimination draw, beginning with the semifinal round.

RACE TO THE TEB BNP PARIBAS WTA CHAMPIONSHIPS (as of October 16, 2011)

SINGLES DOUBLES

PLAYER POINTS RACE STANDING TEAM POINTS RACE STANDING

Caroline Wozniacki* 7395 1 Peschke/Srebotnik* 9291 1

Maria Sharapova* 6370 2 Huber/Raymond* 6773 2

Petra Kvitova* 5890 3 Dulko/Pennetta* 5846 3

Victoria Azarenka* 5590 4 King/Shvedova* 5730 4

Li Na* 5351 5

Vera Zvonareva* 5190 6

Samantha Stosur* 5115 7

Agnieszka Radwanska 4940 8

Marion Bartoli 4735 9

Andrea Petkovic 4455 10

*Denotes player/team has already qualified