Caroline Wozniacki

I decided that the first player I should analyze in my mini series on newer generation of players (not newest) would be Caroline Wozniacki, the current world number one.

Name: Caroline Wozniacki

Country: Denmark

Rank: 1

Coach: Piotr Wozniacki (With assistance from Sven Groeneveld)

Playing Style: She plays a very defensive game. She is a pretty good mover, and she has excellent anticipation. She plays high percentage tennis which means that she doesn't hit very many unforced errors or winners. She tends to stay near the baseline, and she generally hits cross court shots as the net is lower in the middle of the court which allows for more margin. Because her game is so reliant on her opponent making mistakes, she does not play very aggressively and take many chances.

Her first serve is usually in the high 90's or the low 100's. She has decent placement on it. Her second serve is more of a puffball serve that has a lot of spin on it. Her second serve is quite attackable. She has a good backhand that she can occasionally hit winners off of, but her forehand is quite weak.

Although one would think that her game would be best suited to clay because the clay would give her extra time to retrieve balls, Wozniacki's best results have come on hard courts. Her worst surface is definitely grass. Wimbledon is the only slam that she hasn't been to the quarterfinals of.

The Next Step: She needs to stop playing so passively. In her loss to Dominika Cibulkova at Wimbledon 2011, Wozniacki played a great first set. She was actually playing with controlled aggression. However, once Cibulkova started to hit her stride, Wozniacki started to go back to her passive play which ultimately lost her the match.

Is most matches, Wozniacki can get by through her opponent's errors. Because of her anticipation, it is quite hard to hit her off the court. However, many players have started to realize that the way to beat her is through consistent and controlled hard hitting. Pummeling balls at her forehand will result in weak returns and an open court to hit winners to when the short balls inevitably come. Other strategies include hitting high and hard balls at her backhand.

If Wozniacki can improve her forehand, she will be much harder to beat. Although it will most likely never be a weapon for her, the number one player in the world shouldn't have such a glaring weakness. Her backhand, however, can be a weapon. In the early rounds of Wimbledon, she was using her backhand to open up the court, and she was actually hitting some winners. She was also trying to come up to net, and, though she wasn't having much success, she was getting better. Good net play will help her close out matches instead of having to rely on her opponent's mistakes. Although she can win most of her matches against most players by letting them beat themselves, she won't win a slam playing like that.

Besides playing less during the year so she can actually improve her game, she needs to play more aggressively in the early rounds since she knows she'll win regardless of how she plays. That way, when she meets the players who can actually threaten her, she can have a fighting chance at winning without having to hope that they'll self-destruct.