Marketa Vondrousova

Marketa Vondrousova is the left-handed Czech shotmaker who built a Grand Slam résumé out of touch, angles, and repeated surgery — the rare throwback in a baseline-power era. Born in Sokolov in 1999, she was a junior world No. 1 who turned pro fast and won her first WTA title at 17 in just her second tour-level event, the 2017 Ladies Open Biel/Bienne, reaching the top 100 before her 18th birthday.

Her game is the antidote to flat-hitting orthodoxy: a heavily-disguised drop shot, lefty slice, sharp cross-court angles, and a willingness to pull opponents forward and pass them. She doesn't overpower anyone — she reorganizes the geometry of the rally. On grass, where the slice stays low and the variety bites hardest, that toolkit travels best.

The career arc reads as a series of comebacks bookending breakthroughs. She reached her first major final at the 2019 French Open as a teenager, then lost chunks of seasons to wrist surgeries. The crowning act came at Wimbledon 2023, where she became the first unseeded woman to win the title in the Open Era, beating Ons Sabalenka-tier names en route and pushing her toward a career-high ranking inside the top 10. An Olympic silver in 2021 sits alongside it.

This season she's working back up from No. 48, the familiar position of rebuilding ranking points after another injury layoff. The form benchmarks remain the names at the top of the draw — Iga Swiatek, Elena Rybakina, and fellow Czech Barbora Krejcikova — and the grass stretch through Wimbledon is, as always, where her ceiling is highest.