[Thrilla]

The 19-year-old Catherine Bellis has been among the most promising players of the new generation, finishing 2014 as the best junior in the world at the age of 15 and also as the youngest top-100 player on the WTA list two years later and in the top-50 in 2017! Back in October 2014, CiCi won two professional titles in back-to-back weeks, followed by another one in 2015 and more good results in 2016 when she had a breakthrough run that propelled her inside the top-100.

CiCi had a chance to make a debut in Miami that year before winning her fourth pro crown in June, backed by the quarter-final run at the WTA event in Stanford where she lost to Venus Williams. Bellis saved her best tennis for the US Open, qualifying for the main draw and reaching the third round before falling to Angelique Kerber, earning valuable points and closing the season with 14 straight ITF wins to wrap up the year in the top-100.
CiCi was the semi-finalist in Stanford in 2017, demolishing Petra Kvitova for another semi-final run before losing the last five matches of the season, struggling with injuries and playing just two tournaments after the US Open.
Nonetheless, Bellis was named the WTA Newcomer of the Year as the youngest player in the top-50 and she was ready to make another strong run in 2018. The youngster reached the quarter-final in Doha but her progress was halted after a wrist injury she suffered in March, winning just three games against Victoria Azarenka at the start of Miami and not playing ever since, staying away from the court for more than nine months. Unable to recover for a few months, Bellis decided to undergo a surgery at the end of June and she had to go with another one in order to resolve the problems and start competing again.
At the end of October, CiCi announced she is finally ready to hit the ball again and she planned to make a return at the Hawaii Open last week. Unfortunately, Bellis was forced to withdraw from this event and it is uncertain when we are going to see her on the court again, skipping the entire Australian swing.
In addition, CiCi has announced Dieter Kindlmann as the new coach for 2019, starting to work with the 36-year-old German who is a former hitting partner of Maria Sharapova and who was a part of the coaching team for Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, Laura Robson, Madison Keys and Elise Mertens.
The young American will work on her recovery in the following month and it would be nice to see her ready for action at some WTA event in February or at least during the 'Sunshine Double' at Indian Wells and Miami in March.

https://www.tennisworldusa.org/tenni...ahead-of-2019/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CiCi_Bellis

[jjgold]

some good notes