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Eugenie Bouchard voted the WTA Tour's Most Improved Player for 2014
To the surprise of absolutely no one, Canadian Eugenie Bouchard was voted the WTA Tour's Most Improved player for 2014, after a breakout season that started with the 20-year-old ranked No. 31, and ends with her at No. 7.
Bouchard received 45-of-57 votes from the media (78 per cent) as well as the one media vote given to the fans; she received 49 per cent of the votes in an online poll.
Karolina Pliskova of the Czech Republic was a distant second, with 23 per cent in the online vote, The WTA didn't disclose the order of finish or the details for the other candidates, which also included 29-year-old Aussie Casey Dellacqua, 21-year-old Caroline Garcia of France and 22-year-old American Coco Vandeweghe.
None of the other contenders even finished the season in the top 20, let alone qualified for the WTA Tour Finals as one of the top eight. And Bouchard was the youngest of them all. It wasn't really a race; it was a landslide.
A year ago, the Canadian was winning the Newcomer of the year award, which went to 17-year-old rising star Belinda Bencic of Switzerland this time around.
The story on the WTA Tour website provided an appreciative quote from Bouchard.
"I'm honored to be voted the WTA Most Improved Player Of The Year. Thank you for voting!
"My goal is to try to improve every single day, and I feel like I did that this year. But while I'm proud of my accomplishments, I've already set new goals I want to strive to reach next year. I look forward to continuing to improve!"
Ten of the 21 players in the WTA's history who earned the No. 1 ranking received the Most Improved award along the way, a modern list that doesn't include Chris Evert or Martina Navratilova but begins with Steffi Graf.
Victoria Azarenka and Caroline Wozniacki, the last two No. 1-ranked players before Serena Williams took out a patent on the top spot, did not win it.
But interestingly, six of them – Steffi Graf, Monica Seles, Martina Hingis, Maria Sharapova, Ana Ivanovic and Dinara Safina – won the award one year, and rose to No. 1 the very next year.
That would be a tall order in 2015. But before the 2014 started, perhaps only Bouchard herself believed that she could accomplish what she did.
Bouchard is currently in the British Virgin Islands, taking part in a week-long exhibition event hosted by Virgin billionaire Richard Branson.
Ah, the life.
style="margin: 8px 0 0 0; padding: 0 4px;">Not a bad view from your balcony 😉
Kuva, jonka Genie Bouchard (@geniebouchard) julkaisi Marras 11, 2014 at 6:33 PST
