Maria Kirilenko

Maria Kirilenko

Country (sports)	Russia
Residence	Moscow, Russia
Height	1.73 m (5 ft 8 in)
Turned pro	2001
Retired	Active
Plays	Right
Prize money	$1,853,490
Singles
Career record	201–137
Career titles	5 (3 ITF Circuit titles)
Highest ranking	No. 18 (July 7, 2008)
Grand Slam singles results
Australian Open	4r (2008)
French Open	3r (2006)
Wimbledon	2r (2005)
US Open	3r (2003, 2006, 2007)
Doubles
Career record	110–86
Career titles	5 WTA
Highest ranking	No. 21 (February 6, 2006)
Last updated on: November 23, 2008.

Maria Yuryevna Kirilenko (Russian: Мари́я Ю́рьевна Кириле́нко; born January 25, 1987) is a Russian professional tennis player. Born in Moscow, she won her first WTA Tour title in 2005, defeating Anna-Lena Groenefeld 6–3, 6–4 in the China Open. Kirilenko reached #18, her career-high singles ranking, on the WTA tour in July 2008. She is a good friend of Maria Sharapova. She is affectionately called Makiri. She won the junior event at the 2002 Canadian Open, as well as the 2002 US Open junior tournament. In December 2004 she played in a tennis exhibition in Tampa, Florida to raise money for the Florida Hurricane Relief Fund.

In 2006, she was selected to be the face of Adidas by Stella McCartney tennis range, designed by noted British fashion designer Stella McCartney. Since the 2006 Australian Open, Kirilenko has played in adidas clothing and footwear designed by Stella McCartney at all upcoming tournaments. Like her good friend Maria Sharapova, she likes connecting athletics and fashion, and when she spoke to Teen Vogue in August 2006, she said of being dressed by McCartney for a banquet, "I felt so glamorous!"

Tennis career

Junior career

Maria Kirilenko

Maria Kirilenko started showing a passion towards tennis at age 5, but it was difficult to get the practice in while she was attending school. Her father enrolled her in a tennis school, and hours of fierce training started to pay off as she won several tournaments.

When Kirilenko was twelve years old, an Honored Master of sports, Elena Brioukhovets, saw her while training. All the next year Elena watched Maria making progress and then offered to work together with her. A three-year program was made and a special team was selected. In less than three years Maria became the number one in her age group and the number two in the group under eighteen. The well-known tennis-players Yevgeni Kafelnikov, Andrei Olhovskiy and Max Mirnyi, who had created an organization supporting young tennis-players, helped Kirilenko to arrange her training-process and to attend tournaments.

In 2002 Kirilenko became one of the youngest winners of the Canadian Open and the US Open Junior Tournaments.

Turned Pro

Since September 2002 Kirilenko started participating in WTA events. She made a lot of progress in WTA events but was setback by injury in 2004 and dropped down the rankings, whilst missing out on valuable experience. At the end of 2005 she had climbed right up the rankings and won her first title in Beijing. She has been recognized as one of the up and coming players of 2006 and, despite being off her best form during the Summer, she has broken into the top 20 for the first time on June 12, 2006.

Kirilenko made her debut for Russia at the nation-based Fed Cup tournament in April 2006 on the World Group Quarter-Final tie against Belgium. Maria lost a singles rubber against '05 US Open champion Kim Clijsters and won her doubles rubber against multiple major champion Justine Henin-Hardenne and the same Kim Clijsters partnering Dinara Safina. Russia ended up losing 3–2.

At the 2006 US Open, Kirilenko received the 20th seed of the tournament and reached the 3rd Round, eventually being defeated by Aravane Rezaï.

2007

In January 2007, she advanced to the third round of the 2007 Australian Open, before being defeated by third-seed Svetlana Kuznetsova, immediately after which she competed in the 2007 Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo, where she advanced to the second round upsetting #15 Shahar Pe'er of Israel, before being defeated by Ai Sugiyama. She then competed in the Dubai Tennis Championships in Dubai, where she reached the second round, before losing in a close match to Daniela Hantuchová 6–2 4–6 6–7 (4/7).

Kirilenko at Wimbledon 2007

At the Acura Classic in San Diego, California, Kirilenko upset second seeded Jelena Janković of Serbia with a score of 6–2, 3–6, 7–5 to advance to the quarter-finals, before losing to fellow Russian Elena Dementieva 6–2, 6–4. At the East West Bank Classic in Los Angeles, California she also reached the quarters, upsetting #6 seed Marion Bartoli in straight sets, 7–6(2), 6–3, along the way.

Unseeded at the US Open, she faced Martina Müller of Germany, defeating her in straight sets 6–3, 6–1. She then beat #22 seed Katarina Srebotnik of Slovenia in straight sets too, 6–4, 6–3. She then lost to the unseeded Julia Vakulenko of Ukraine in easy straight sets, 6–2, 6–4. After the US Open, she appeared in the Sunfeast Open. There, Kirilenko won her second WTA Tour singles title, defeating unseeded Mariya Koryttseva of Ukraine in straight sets 6–0,6–2. En route to the finals, she had beaten some very in form players namely Daniela Hantuchová, Flavia Pennetta, up and coming Ekaterina Ivanova and Indian qualifier Neha Uberoi. The next week at a tournament in Seoul, Kirilenko, as the #4 seed has also reached the finals but lost to #1 seed and current Wimbledon champion Venus Williams of the USA in three sets 3–6, 6–1, 4–6.

2008

Kirilenko at Cincinnati in 2008

At the Australian Open, Kirilenko reached the fourth round of a Grand Slam tournament for the first time in her career, by beating No. 6 seed Anna Chakvetadze in three sets (6–7, 6–1, 6–2). Her next opponent was Daniela Hantuchová, to whom she lost in the fourth round 1–6, 6–4, 6–4, after leading 6–1, 3–1.

Kirilenko then reached the second round of a Tier I event in Doha, beating Ekaterina Makarova before losing to Anabel Medina Garrigues in three sets, 6-2 5-7 1-6. Kirilenko then lost four matches in a row at Dubai, Bangalore, Indian Wells and Miami. However, as the second seed, she reached the final of a Tier IV event at Estoril, where she defeated Iveta Benešová in straight sets, 6-4 6-2. She also won the doubles title in Estoril, partnering Flavia Pennetta. Maria also won in Barcelona; in the final Kirilenko faced Martinez-Sanchez and won 6-0 6-2 for her fourth career WTA title and the second this year.

Kirilenko played at the Tier III tournament in Cincinnati in August where she was the number 3 seed. She reached the semi-finals, where she lost 1-6 6-2 6-1 to eventual champion Nadia Petrova. She partnered with Petrova as the 2nd seed doubles team that beat the number 1 seed pair of Su-Wei Hsieh and Yaroslava Shvedova in the finals, 6-3 4-6 10-8.

2009

Kirilenko was seeded 27th at the 2009 Australian Open. She lost in the first round to unseeded Sara Errani of Italy 6-0 6-4 in the tournament's first upset.

WTA Tour titles (5)

Singles (5)

Legend

Grand Slam (0)

WTA Championships (0)

Tier I (0)

Tier II (1)

Tier III (1)

Tier IV (3)

ITF Circuit (3)

No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Opponent in final	Score in final
1.	January 19, 2003	Boca Raton, United States	Hard	Sonya Jeyaseelan	6–3, 6–0
2.	May 16, 2004	Saint-Gaudens, France	Clay	Stéphanie Foretz	7–6, 6–3
3.	September 5, 2005	Beijing, China	Hard	Anna-Lena Grönefeld	6–3, 6–4
4.	September 23, 2007	Kolkata, India	Carpet (i)	Mariya Koryttseva	6–0, 6–2
5.	December 16, 2007	Dubai, United Arab Emirates	Hard	Evgeniya Rodina	7–5, 6–2
6.	April 20, 2008	Estoril, Portugal	Clay	Iveta Benešová	6–4, 6–2
7.	June 15, 2008	Barcelona, Spain	Clay	María José Martínez Sánchez	6–0, 6–2
8.	September 18, 2008	Seoul, Korea	Hard	Samantha Stosur	2–6, 6–1, 6–4

Doubles (5)

Legend (Wins/Runner-up)

Grand Slam (0/0)

WTA Championships (0/0)

Tier I (0/1)

Tier II (1/0)

Tier III (3/1)

Tier IV (1/1)

Wins (5)

No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Partner	Opponent in final	Score in final
1.	June 13, 2004	Birmingham, Great Britain	Grass	Maria Sharapova	Lisa McShea Milagros Sequera	6–2, 6–1
2.	October 9, 2005	Tokyo, Japan	Hard	Gisela Dulko	Shinobu Asagoe Maria Vento-Kabchi	7–5, 4–6, 6–3
3.	March 3, 2007	Doha, Qatar	Hard	Martina Hingis	Ágnes Szávay Vladimíra Uhlířová	6–1, 6–1
4.	April 19, 2008	Estoril, Portugal	Clay	Flavia Pennetta	Mervana Jugić-Salkić İpek Şenoğlu	6–4, 6–4
5.	August 18, 2008	Cincinnati, United States	Hard	Nadia Petrova	Su-Wei Hsieh Yaroslava Shvedova	6-3, 4-6, [10-8]

Runner-ups (3)

No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Partner	Opponent in final	Score in final
1.	June 19, 2006	's-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands	Grass	Ana Ivanović	Yan Zi Zheng Jie	3–6, 6–2, 6–2
2.	August 3, 2008	Montreal, Canada	Hard	Flavia Pennetta	Cara Black Liezel Huber	6-1, 6–1
3.	September 28, 2008	Seoul, South Korea	Hard	Vera Dushevina	Chuang Chia-jung Hsieh Su-wei	6-3, 6–0

Singles performance timeline

Tournament	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009	Career SR	Career Win-Loss
Australian Open	-	-	-	2R	3R	3R	4R	1R	0 / 5	8–5
French Open	-	-	2R	1R	3R	2R	2R	N/A	0 / 5	5–5
Wimbledon	-	-	1R	2R	1R	1R	1R	N/A	0 / 5	1–5
US Open	-	3R	2R	2R	3R	3R	1R	N/A	0 / 6	8–6
Grand Slam SR	0 / 0	0 / 1	0 / 3	0 / 4	0 / 4	0 / 4	0 / 4	0 / 1	0 / 21	N/A
Grand Slam Win-Loss	0–0	2–1	2–3	3–4	6–4	3–3	4–4	0-1	N/A	23-20
Doha	Not Tier I						2R	N/A	0 / 1	1-1
Indian Wells	-	-	1R	4R	3R	3R	2R	N/A	0 / 5	8-5
Key Biscayne, Florida	-	-	2R	2R	4R	2R	2R	N/A	0 / 5	6-5
Charleston	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	N/A	0 / 0	0-0
Berlin	-	-	-	2R	3R	1R	3R	N/A	0 / 4	5-4
Rome	-	-	-	1R	1R	1R	3R	N/A	0 / 4	2-4
Montréal/Toronto	-	-	-	1R	2R	2R	2R	N/A	0 / 4	3-4
Tokyo	-	-	-	2R	QF	2R	1R	N/A	0 / 4	4-4
Moscow	-	-	-	1R	1R	1R	1R	N/A	0 / 4	0-4
Zurich	-	-	-	-	QF	1R	Not Tier I	N/A	0 / 2	2-2
San Diego	Not Tier I		-	1R	1R	QF	NH	N/A	0 / 3	3-3
WTA Tour Championships	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	N/A	0 / 0	0-0
Year End Ranking	417	122	111	25	30	25	29	N/A	N/A	N/A

- = did not participate in the tournament / did not qualify for main draw SR = the ratio of the number of singles tournaments won to the number of those tournaments played. NH = tournament was not held.

External links

• Official website
• Maria Kirilenko at the Women's Tennis Association

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