Tennis is an independent sport where the person works only for themselves and working on yourself is the best kind of motivation one can have. Upon that if your family supports you well you already are a star, and today we are going to talk about such a sports star who had her family's support and confident about herself i.e SIMONA HALEP.
Simona Halep is a Romanian professional tennis player. She has been ranked world No.1 in singles twice between 2017 and 2019. In total, she has been No.1 for a total 64 weeks, which ranked 10th in the history of the World's tennis association(WTA) rankings. Halep was No.1 in the year-end of 2017 and 2018. She has finished each year ranked no lower than No.4 since 2014 and has the longest active streak of being ranked in the top 10. She has won 19 WTA singles-winner and finished runner up 17 times. Halep has won 2 grand slam singles titles: The 2018 French open and 2019 Wimbledon championship.
Halep was born on 27th September 1991 and as the date is coming closer we would love to talk about her achievements, her professional career and her personal life in order to embrace the beauty of her sport and the way she plays it.
Early Life
Simona Halep was born on 27th September 1991 in Constanta, to Stere and Tania Halep, who are of Aromanian Descent. Halep's father played lower division football for AS Sageata Stejaru and worked as a zootechnics technician before becoming the owner of a dairy product factory. He developed an interest in supporting his children with whatever career they wanted to pursue and that is the reason that made Simona good at her sport.
Halep started playing tennis when she was 4-years-old after watching her brother play the sport. Although her brother stopped playing tennis but she got so involved that she started playing the game twice a week, then when she was six she started playing it daily. Her main interest was tennis but she also played Football and Handball while growing up.
Simona Halep's Junior Career:
Halep is a former world No.1 junior. She began to play in the ITF junior circuit in 2015 at the age of 13 and finished runner-up at the low-level at the grade 4 Mamaia-sen junior ITF Tournament in Romania in her second career event. She won all 4 ITF singles events she entered including Mamaia-sen tournament which was reclassified with the mid-level grade 3. She also faced Romania at the junior fed cup that year alongside Irina-Camelia Begu and Andreea Mitu. The team finished at the ninth place. Halep moved her career in a positive direction when she won her first and only grade 1 title at the peril memorial in Umag in April. She also made her junior grand slam debut that year, losing in the third round at the US Open, French Open and Wimbledon.
HALEP WITH THE JUNIOR FRENCH OPEN TROPHY IN 2008
Simona Halep’s Professional Career:
2006-2010
Halep turned pro in 2006 and started her professional career playing low-level $10K ITF Woman's circuit events in Romania in 2006 and 2007.
She won her ITF singles and doubles titles back to back in Bucharest in May 2017.
After accomplishing the feat third time the following year, Halep won her first $25K doubles in Sweden in 2008.
She started playing more higher-level games once she ended with her junior career reaching to $50K final in 2009 in Makarska.
Towards the end of the year, she defeated No.96 Angelique Kerber for the first top 100 victories and also reached the semi-finals of a $50K event in Minsk to make her debut in top 200 of WTA ratings.
She then made her WTA debut in 2010 by getting qualified for 3 major events where she lost 2 events and as for the third one it was the first WTA career finals, finishing runner-up at the morocco open to Iveta Benesova.
The match helped her rise from No.166 to No.110.
2011-2012
She played almost exclusively WTA tour event in 2011.
She won her first career grand slam match at the Australian Open.
She finished the year 2011 by No.47 ranking in the world.
Halep maintained a steady ranking in the year 2012, rising no higher than No.37 in the world falling no lower than No.63 and finishing the year No.47 for the second consecutive year.
She won just one single grand slam match the whole year that came at the US Open.
2013
Her first breakthrough came at the Italian Open where she reached semi-finals as a qualifier.
She defeated three top 20 players at the premier 5 events before loosing to world no.1 Serena Williams.
2014
Halep greatly improved her Grand Slam result in 2014.
She reached her first grand slam quarterfinals at the Australian Open with a victory over No.8 Jelena Jankovic where she was upset by No.20 Dominika Cibulkova.
With the result of her performance, she made her debut in the top 10 WTA rankings.
she had not lost a set before her French open, made her the first woman to reach maiden grand slam without dropping a set since Martina Hingis in Australian open in 1997.
She ended the year by being No.2 in the world.
HALEP(THIRD FROM RIGHT) WITH OTHER COMPETITORS AT 2014 WTA FINALS
2015
Halep had a strong start in 2015, reaching at least the quarterfinals in her first six events.
After a title for the first event of the year, she lost in the Australian Open quarterfinals for straight 2 years.
At the end of the season after so many ups and downs, she was qualified for the WTA finals and became a top seed at the event after Williams withdrew.
2016-2018
Halep underperformed at the grand slam event in 2016 and also started the year at a little rough and untidy note.
She had faced many failures that year but still managed to end the year with a No.4 ranking in the world.
For the second straight season, Halep had a slow start to the year 2017.
She once again lost at the opening match of the Australian Open.
Then she made it to the Canadian open but lost it to Svitolina.
Despite of losses by covering up in small matches she took the position of No.1 taking the ranking from Muguruza.
She was the first Romanian to hold the No.2 rank and 7th woman to hold this rank without even winning a grand slam trophy.
She ended the year 2017 being No.1 in the world.
Halep kept the No.1 ranking for the entire year only after loosing for 4 weeks in February.
She started the season by winning both the singles and doubles at the Shenzhen Open.
Having not won a match at the Australian Open for three years Halep made it all the way through her third grand slam final.
Halep and Lauren Davis tied the Australian open match with 48.
The match was ranked as the third-best woman's match of the year and seventh-best overall.
Halep made her 2nd grand slam final in a row and 2nd consecutive French Open final defeating No.12 Angelique Kerber and No.3 Garbine Muguruza in semi-final and quarterfinals.
She ended the year by dealing with her achilles injury and then a back injury.
2019
After recovering from her back injury she started the year 2019. she lost her first match back at Sydney international to Ashleigh Barty.
She received a difficult draw at Australian Open and lost to Serena Williams in 4th round.
For the first time in three years, she didn't make it to the finals in the French Open.
At Wimbledon, Halep made to finals as seventh seed only dropping one set in the seventh round against Mihaela Buzarnescu.
She did not face a seeded opponent until she defeated No.8 Elina Svitolina in the semi-finals.
Halep faced Serena Williams in the finals and defeated her under an hour.
HALEP WITH HER WIMBLEDON TROPHY
All the struggle that was done by this sports star makes us realise that nothing comes easily to us if we don't work for it.
Although Simona worked so hard for winning the US Open but couldn't for so many years, this didn't stop her from writing her own destiny. She pushed herself and made it to the place she wanted to see herself.
And on her birthday around the corner, we would love to wish her with all the luck and love to succeed in her life and reach the heights in life that she truly deserves.
