Teliana Santos Pereira (born 20 July 1988) is a Brazilian former professional

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...

player. On 19 April 2015, she became the first Brazilian in 27 years to win a title on the

WTA Tour The WTA Tour is a worldwide top-tier tennis tour for women organized by the Women's Tennis Association. The second-tier tour is the WTA 125K series, and third-tier is the ITF Women's Circuit. The men's equivalent is the ATP Tour. WTA Tour tourna ...

, beating

Yaroslava Shvedova Yaroslava Vyacheslavovna Shvedova (; born 12 September 1987) is a Kazakhstani former professional tennis player. Before 2008, she represented her country of birth, Russia. She won one singles title and 13 doubles titles on the WTA Tour, plus o ...

Bogotá Bogotá (, also , , ), officially Bogotá, Distrito Capital, abbreviated Bogotá, D.C., and formerly known as Santa Fe de Bogotá (; ) during the Spanish period and between 1991 and 2000, is the capital city of Colombia, and one of the larges ...

7–6, 6–1. She achieved a singles ranking of world No. 48 in August 2015, after having won her second WTA title at

Florianópolis Florianópolis () is the capital and second largest city of the state of Santa Catarina, in the South region of Brazil. The city encompasses Santa Catarina Island and surrounding small islands, as well as part of the mainland. It has a populat ...

by defeating German

Annika Beck Annika Beck (; born 16 February 1994) is a German former professional tennis player. She started playing tennis at the age of four when introduced to the game by her parents. A baseliner whose favorite shot is forehand, and favorite surface is ...

in three sets. On 19 October 2015, she reached her best singles ranking of world No. 43. Pereira won 22 singles and ten doubles titles on the ITF Circuit. Playing for

Brazil Fed Cup team The Brazil Billie Jean King Cup team represents Brazil in the Billie Jean King Cup tennis competition and are governed by the Brazilian Tennis Confederation. They currently compete in the Americas Zone of Group I. History Brazil competed in its ...

, she has a win–loss record of 26–11 in international competition.

Early and personal life

Teliana Pereira was born on 20 July 1988 in Águas Belas, and was coached by her brother, Renato. Pereira's parents are Jose, who worked at a

sugar cane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of (often hybrid) tall, perennial grass (in the genus ''Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with stout, jointed, fibrous stalks t ...

plantation, and Maria; she has three brothers and three sisters. At a very young age, her father moved to

Curitiba Curitiba () is the capital and largest city in the state of Paraná (state), Paraná in Brazil. The city's population was 1,948,626 , making it the List of cities in Brazil by population, eighth most populous city in Brazil and the largest in ...

, where he had two brothers, and once he got a job at a tennis academy, he arranged for the rest of the family to follow him. Everyone got work at the academy as well, with Teliana being a

ball girl Ball boys and ball girls, also known as ball kids are individuals, usually human youths but sometimes dogs, who retrieve and supply balls for players or officials in sports such as association football, American football, bandy, cricket, tennis ...

. Given the academy owner, Frenchman Didier Rayon, brought the Pereira children to the court whenever a student did not show up, Pereira started playing at age 8, and said that she already had grown an interest watching Renato play. One year later, she entered a tournament and won, making Rayon decide to become her coach. Pereira's favorite tournament is the

French Open The French Open (french: Internationaux de France de tennis), also known as Roland-Garros (), is a major tennis tournament held over two weeks at the Stade Roland Garros in Paris, France, beginning in late May each year. The tournament and ven ...

. Her childhood tennis idol was

Gustavo Kuerten Gustavo "Guga" Kuerten (; born 10 September 1976) is a Brazilian former world No. 1 tennis player. He won the French Open singles title three times ( 1997, 2000, and 2001), and was the Tennis Masters Cup champion in 2000. During his career he ...

. Her favourite surface is

clay Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4). Clays develop plasticity when wet, due to a molecular film of water surrounding the clay par ...

Career

In February 2013, Pereira reached the semifinals of

Copa Colsanitas The Copa Colsanitas is a women's professional tennis tournament held in Bogotá, Colombia at the Centro de Alto Rendimiento. Held since 1998, this WTA 250 tournament is played on outdoor clay courts A clay court is one of the types of tenni ...

as a qualifier, which boosted her singles ranking to 116. In February 2014, she reached the semifinals of the

Rio Open The Rio Open, also known as the ''Rio Open presented by Claro'' for sponsorship reasons, is a tennis event on the ATP Tour and former WTA International Tournaments event. The tournament is played on outdoor clay courts at the Jockey Club Brasilei ...

. In April 2015, Pereira reached the final of

, where she won her first WTA title beating fifth seed

, in straight sets to become the first Brazilian woman to win a WTA singles title since 1988, and jumping 130 places up the WTA rankings to No. 81. In July 2015, she won her second WTA Tour title at the

Brasil Tennis Cup The Brasil Tennis Cup was a professional women's tennis tournament contested in various Brazilian cities since 1977. The last edition was played on outdoor hard courts in Florianópolis, Brazil. In 2015, the tournament was held on clay courts. ...

. With the result, Pereira entered the top 50 for the first time. She was just the second Brazilian in the

Open era The racket sport traditionally named lawn tennis, invented in Birmingham, England now commonly known simply as tennis, is the direct descendant of what is now denoted real tennis or royal tennis, which continues to be played today as a separate sp ...

to win a WTA title in Brazil – Niege Dias achieved the feat once, doing it over in Guarujá in 1987. Pereira performed very poorly throughout 2016 and finally dropped out of top 200 by the end of the season. In September 2020, Pereira announced her retirement at the age of 32, declaring she had lost interest in training and travels, while expressing satisfaction with how her career went, with two WTA titles and "always surpassing my expectations".Aos 32 anos de idade, Teliana Pereira anuncia sua aposentadoria do tênis
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Grand Slam performance timelines

Singles

WTA career finals

Singles: 2 (2 titles)

WTA Challenger finals

Doubles: 1 (runner-up)

ITF Circuit finals

Singles: 31 (22 titles, 9 runner–ups)

Doubles: 22 (10 titles, 12 runner–ups)

Record against players who were ranked top 10

''Ranked top 10 at some point in their career (but not necessarily when they faced Pereira)''

Notes

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Pereira, Teliana 1988 births Living people Sportspeople from Alagoas Brazilian female tennis players Tennis players at the 2007 Pan American Games Tennis players at the 2011 Pan American Games Pan American Games bronze medalists for Brazil Olympic tennis players of Brazil Tennis players at the 2016 Summer Olympics Pan American Games medalists in tennis South American Games medalists in tennis South American Games gold medalists for Brazil Competitors at the 2006 South American Games Medalists at the 2007 Pan American Games