Chanelle Scheepers

Chanelle Scheepers ( ; born 13 March 1984) is a retired South African tennis player.

She won one singles and one doubles title on the WTA Tour, as well as 12 singles and 20 doubles titles on the ITF Women's Circuit in her career. On 10 October 2011, she reached her best singles ranking of world No. 37. On 10 April 2014, she peaked at No. 42 in the doubles rankings.

Career

Scheepers turned professional in 2000 and played two ITF events. In 2001, she reached four finals at ITF level and won all, with three of them coming from Durban, South Africa a local tournament, and one in the United States.

In 2002, she reached three ITF finals winning one in Mackay, Australia and losing in the other two in Liechtenstein and Switzerland.

In 2003, she played her first tour-level event in the Australian Hard Court Championships and won her first main-draw tour-level match after getting through the qualifying draw over Samantha Stosur but lost to Tathiana Garbin in the next round. She then had a 19 match losing streak in the qualifying draws of tour-level and ITF events and main-draw of ITF events.

Scheepers won four ITF titles in 2004; two in Benin City, Nigeria and two in Pretoria, South Africa. She also reached four other finals in Torre del Greco and Taranto both in Italy, in Pétange, Luxembourg and Lagos, Nigeria.

In 2005, Scheepers once again started playing in the qualifying draw of tour-level events, but she did not produce results, as she only reached one semifinals and one quarterfinals in ITF events.

2006 was not a better year for Scheepers, despite returning to the ITF circuit, as she only reached two semifinals and one quarterfinal.

In 2007, Scheepers won her first ITF titles in three years, as she won two titles in Lagos, Nigeria and Allentown, Pennsylvania, United States.

In 2008, her form went down as she only reached one semifinal and two quarterfinals. Scheepers has a breakthrough year in 2009, as she made her Grand Slam main-draw debut getting through the qualifying draw in the Australian Open and French Open. She also had four main-draw wins and won a title in Irapuato, Mexico.

In 2010, Scheepers continued to play in the tour-level events, and her persistence paid off as she reached her first main-draw quarterfinal in the Malaysian Open, losing to Japanese player Ayumi Morita. She then won in the ITF event of Fort Walton Beach, United States. At the French Open, after coming through the qualifying draw, she won her first Grand Slam main-draw match over Frenchwoman Mathilde Johansson in straight sets. She then continued her form by upsetting both, Gisela Dulko and Akgul Amanmuradova. She lost to world No. 5, Elena Dementieva in the fourth round in straight sets. As a result of this performance, she was awarded a wildcard into the main-draw of Wimbledon, where she lost in the first round to ninth seed and eventual quarter-finalist Li Na.

In 2011, she made the third round of the Australian Open. Following modest results for much of the rest of the year, Scheepers reached the third round of the US Open, where she held match points against Francesca Schiavone, before losing the match in three sets. Following that, she won her first WTA single titles at the Guangzhou International Women's Open as seventh seed, defeating eighth seed Magdaléna Rybáriková in the final. Scheepers achieved her career-high singles ranking of world No. 37 following the tournament.

In July 2012, she reached the second round of Mercury Insurance Open in Carlsbad, California, USA, losing to Varvara Lepchenko.

At the 2013 Wimbledon Championships, she teamed with Shuko Aoyama and reached the semifinals in women's doubles. Scheepers was runner-up at the 2014 Swedish Open, losing to Mona Barthel in the final.

She retired from professional tennis in August 2015, and later started coaching American tennis player Alison Riske.

Personal life Scheepers married Roger Anderson, her former coach, on 10 November 2012, in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands.

Performance timelines Only main-draw results in WTA Tour, Grand Slam tournaments, Fed Cup and Olympic Games are included in win–loss records.

Singles

Doubles

WTA career finals Singles: 2 (1 title, 1 runner-up) LegendGrand Slam WTA Premier Mandatory & 5 WTA Premier WTA International (1–1)

Doubles: 5 (1 title, 4 runner-ups) Legend Grand Slam WTA Premier Mandatory & 5 WTA PremierWTA International (1–4)

ITF Circuit finals Legend $100,000 tournaments $75,000 tournaments $50,000 tournaments $25,000 tournaments $10,000 tournaments

Singles: 19 (12 titles, 7 runner-ups)

Doubles: 36 (20 titles, 16 runner-ups)