page_title: Daria Kasatkina
section_title: 2016: First top ten victory, top 25
hierarchical_section_title: Daria Kasatkina / Professional career / 2016: First top ten victory, top 25
caption_attribution_description: Day 1 of Wimbledon 2016
context_page_description: Daria Sergeyevna Kasatkina is a Russian professional tennis player. She made her top 10 debut in the Women's Tennis Association rankings towards the end of the 2018 season. She has won two WTA titles in singles as well as one in doubles.
  Born to athletic parents who were nationally ranked in athletics and ice hockey, Kasatkina began playing tennis at age six at the insistence of her older brother. She excelled as a junior, winning the European 16s championship and one junior Grand Slam singles title at the 2014 French Open. Kasatkina quickly ascended up the professional rankings, reaching No. 32 in the world while still 18 years old and winning her first WTA title as a teenager at the Charleston Open. She rose to prominence in 2018 by finishing runner-up to fellow up-and-coming player Naomi Osaka at the Premier Mandatory Indian Wells Open in a match regarded as representing a new wave of women's tennis. Kasatkina also won the biggest title of her career at the Kremlin Cup at home in Russia towards the end of the season. Following three successful seasons on the WTA Tour, Kasatkina struggled in 2019, falling into the bottom half of the top 100.
context_section_description: During the 2016 season, Kasatkina continued to rise in the WTA rankings, reaching No. 32 in the world while still 18 years old and as high as No. 24 later in the year. She began the year at the Auckland Open, where she recorded her first career top ten victory against world No. 7 Venus Williams. Kasatkina then made her Australian Open debut and reached the third round. She defeated No. 27 Anna Karolína Schmiedlová in the first round before losing to world No. 1 Serena Williams. At her next tournament, she returned to Russia for the St. Petersburg Ladies' Trophy and reached the semifinals, losing to Belinda Bencic. At the Indian Wells Open, Kasatkina then made it to the quarterfinals at her first Premier Mandatory event. She also produced one good result in doubles, a semifinals appearance at the Qatar Total Open with Elena Vesnina. The Russian duo notably defeated Martina Hingis and Sania Mirza to end their 41 match win streak, the longest streak on the WTA Tour since 1990.
  In the middle of the season, Kasatkina again reached the third round at two more Grand Slam events, the French Open and Wimbledon. At both tournaments, she lost tight matches that each ended 10–8 in the third set, the former against Kiki Bertens and the latter against No. 8 Venus Williams. She had two chances to serve out the match against Bertens. Kasatkina continued her success at big tournaments at the Premier 5 Canadian Open, where she reached the quarterfinals. She defeated world No. 8 Roberta Vinci in the third round for her second career top ten victory. Her next tournament was the Rio Olympics. She qualified for the singles event through her ranking, and also entered the doubles event with Svetlana Kuznetsova after Margarita Gasparyan withdrew due to injury. Kasatkina reached the quarterfinals at both events, falling just short of the medal rounds. She lost to American Madison Keys in singles and the Czech team of Andrea Hlaváčková and Lucie Hradecká in doubles. At the US Open, her streak of four consecutive third round appearances at majors was ended in the opening round by Wang Qiang.
  Kasatkina's last big singles result of the season came at the Premier 5 Wuhan Open, where she made it to the third round. She had needed to qualify for the main draw after forgetting to sign up for the tournament. For the second consecutive year, Kasatkina reached the doubles final at the Kremlin Cup, this time with Daria Gavrilova. The pair finished runner-up to Hlaváčková and Hradecká. Kasatkina ended the season at a world ranking of No. 27.
caption: Kasatkina at the 2016 Wimbledon Championships
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