Sofya Andreyevna Zhuk ( rus, Софья Андреевна Жук, , ˈsofʲjə ɐnˈdrʲe(j)ɪvnə ˈʐuk; born 1 December 1999) is a former Russian tennis player. She won the 2015 Wimbledon girls' singles title.

Career

Early career

Zhuk trained at the Justine Henin Academy in Belgium and her coach was Olivier Jeunehomme. Her best win to date on the professional tour has been at a $60K tournament in Turkey, where she beat home favourite

İpek Soylu İpek Soylu (born 15 April 1996) is a professional Turkish female tennis player. Soylu has won three doubles titles on the WTA Tour The WTA Tour is a worldwide top-tier tennis tour for women organized by the Women's Tennis Association. The s ...

in the final. In 2014, she won her first tournament at Shymkent and became only the 17th 14-year-old in ITF history to win an open tournament at that age, joining a group which includes former world number ones

Justine Henin Justine Henin (; born 1 June 1982) is a Belgian former professional tennis player. She spent a total of 117 weeks as the world No. 1 and was the year-end No. 1 in 2003, 2006 and 2007. Henin, coming from a country with limited success in tenni ...

and

Dinara Safina Dinara Mubinovna Safina (; ; tt-Cyrl, Динара Мөбин кызы Сафина; born April 27, 1986) is a Russian former world No. 1 tennis player. Safina was runner-up in singles at the 2008 French Open, 2009 Australian Open, and the ...

. In 2015, Zhuk competed as an unseeded 15-year-old at Wimbledon, where she won the junior girls' title against fellow Russian and No. 12 ranked junior

Anna Blinkova Anna Vladimirovna Blinkova ( rus, Анна Владимировна Блинкова, , ˈanːə blʲɪnˈkovə, Ru-Anna Blinkova.ogg; born 10 September 1998) is a Russian professional tennis player. She has won one singles and one doubles title ...

in straight sets, 7–5, 6–4. Zhuk did not drop a set in the whole Wimbledon tournament. Zhuk became only the second Russian girl to win the Junior Wimbledon title, following the 2002 final when

Vera Dushevina Vera Yevgenyevna Dushevina ( rus, Вера Евгеньевна Душевина; born 6 October 1986) is a Russian former professional tennis player. She won one singles title and two doubles titles on the WTA Tour. As a junior, she won the ...

defeated compatriot

Maria Sharapova Maria Yuryevna Sharapova ( , ; rus, Мари́я Ю́рьевна Шара́пова, p=mɐˈrʲijə ʂɐˈrapəvə, a=Maria_sharapova.ogg; born 19 April 1987) is a Russian former world No. 1 tennis player. She competed on the WTA Tour from 2 ...

2016

She made her

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 tou ...

singles debut at the 2016 Miami Open, where she received a wildcard into the main draw. She lost in straight sets to

Zhang Shuai Zhang Shuai (; ; born 21 January 1989) is a Chinese professional tennis player. She is a two-time Grand Slam champion in women's doubles, having won the 2019 Australian Open and the 2021 US Open, both alongside Samantha Stosur. Zhang als ...

in the first round.

2018–19

Zhuk reached the second round of qualifying at the Australian Open, losing to Magdalena Frech of Poland, before heading to

Newport Beach Newport Beach is a coastal city in South Orange County, California. Newport Beach is known for swimming and sandy beaches. Newport Harbor once supported maritime industries however today, it is used mostly for recreation. Balboa Island draws ...

in California for their inaugural

WTA 125K series WTA 125 tournaments are an international series of professional women's tennis tournaments organized by the Women's Tennis Association since 2012. In the past (2012–2015) sometimes called the WTA Challenger series Danielle Collins Danielle Rose Collins (born December 13, 1993) is an American professional tennis player. She has reached career-high WTA rankings of No. 7 in singles and world No. 86 in doubles. Collins has won two WTA Tour singles titles, at the 2021 Palerm ...

, six years her senior, in three sets. Collins was her nemesis again when they played at Indian Wells, after both had defeated seeded players. Zhuk recorded her very first

win when she defeated

Alizé Cornet Alizé Cornet (; born 22 January 1990) is a French professional tennis player. Cornet has won six singles and three doubles titles on the WTA Tour, as well as three singles and three doubles titles on the ITF Circuit. On 16 February 2009, she r ...

in the first round, and followed that by beating 18th seed

Magdalena Rybarikova Magdalena may refer to: * Magdalena (given name), a given name derived from Mary Magdalene (including a list of people with the name) Entertainment * Magdalena (comics), an American comic book superheroine * ''Magdalena'' (film), a 1920 Czechos ...

in the second round. Zhuk's second to last service game in that match took well over 20 minutes, with 12 deuces and 30 points. Rybarikova saved eleven match points during the game, before finally winning on only her second break point. Zhuk promptly broke back, and then served out to win in three sets. Collins, though having beaten 15th seed

Madison Keys Madison Keys (born February 17, 1995) is an American professional tennis player. She has been ranked as high as world No. 7 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA), a ranking she first achieved in October 2016. Keys has played in one Grand Sla ...

in the second round, always had the advantage in their third round clash, winning in straight sets. Zhuk nevertheless reached her career-high ranking of 123 after this defeat. She then went to the Premier Mandatory tournament in

Miami Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a coastal metropolis and the county seat of Miami-Dade County in South Florida, United States. With a population of 442,241 at ...

, where she lost in the first round of qualifying. In the European Grand Slam tournaments, she lost in the first qualifying round of the French Open to

Valentini Grammatikopoulou Valentini Grammatikopoulou ( el, Βαλεντίνη Γραμματικοπούλου; born 9 February 1997) is a Greek tennis player. On 22 August 2022, she reached her best singles ranking of world No. 143. On 28 February 2022, she peaked at No ...

, and in the final qualifying round for Wimbledon to

Vitalia Diatchenko Vitalia Anatolyevna Diatchenko ( rus, Виталия Анатольевна Дьяченко, , vʲɪˈtalʲɪjə dʲjɪˈtɕenkə, Ru-Vitalia_Diatchenko.ogg; born 2 August 1990) is a Russian professional tennis player. Her career-high singles ...

, having had her revenge on Grammatikopoulou in the first round.

2020

In 2020, Zhuk announced that she had paused her tennis career because of ongoing injury.

Performance timeline

Singles

WTA 125 tournament finals

Singles: 1 (1 runner-up)

ITF Circuit finals

Singles: 9 (6 titles, 3 runner-ups)

Junior Grand Slam finals

Girls' singles: 1 (1 title)

Awards

;2015 * The Russian Cup in the nomination Junior of the Year

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Zhuk, Sofya 1999 births Living people Tennis players from Moscow Russian female tennis players Wimbledon junior champions Grand Slam (tennis) champions in girls' singles Russian expatriates in Belgium