I wanted to say Osaka but I think she hardly played juniors.

 

Yeah, I had to reword the my OP a little because I know players like Muguruza and Osaka barely played juniors.

 

I think Maria Sakkari is probably the best example. CHR in Juniors of #203, never even won a title despite playing a relatively full schedule and her best result was a grade 4 final. You would not think she'd be even make it as a pro judging by her results as a junior.

 

Yup she was not a good Junior but crédit to her for making it when it really matter in the Pro


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And from your examples, Angie and Petra had their best junior GS results where their first pro GS glory happened 😊

 

Sabalenka
Sakkari

 

Kiki Bertens, as far as I know, she never became Dutch Champion in any category by the Juniors,

 

I think both Sakkari and Sabalenka dont necessarily apply here, because both of them focused on pros from the early days. Many players when having pro success just dont care to keep playing juniors.

Sakkari made her 1st pro final on September 2011 and after that she didnt play another junior tournament (except for the European Championships). So she stopped after 16 yo.

Similar to that Sabalenka didnt play juniors after 16 yo.

Both of them would certainly have played slams and have success if they played at 17 and 18 IMO

 

I think both Sakkari and Sabalenka dont necessarily apply here, because both of them focused on pros from the early days. Many players when having pro success just dont care to keep playing juniors.

Sakkari made her 1st pro final on September 2011 and after that she didnt play another junior tournament (except for the European Championships). So she stopped after 16 yo.

Similar to that Sabalenka didnt play juniors after 16 yo.

Both of them would certainly have played slams and have success if they played at 17 and 18 IMO

Nah, Sakkari admitted that she was way worst than most juniors and could not compete at that level. I remember our attention being on the more talented and younger Grammatikopoulou when they were young and look what happened

 

I would say Serena and Venus but Richard pulled them out of the juniors so I'm not sure if they count.

 

Basically every Italian - Pennetta, Schiavone, Vinci and Errani were Top 7 and GS winners/RUs but in juniors none of them reached Top 25.

 

From memory, Petra Kvitova didn't have a great junior record either. Reached #27 in the rankings and reached a solitary Wimbledon SF back in 2007.

Stosur played a total of 11 Grand Slam juniors and never advanced further than the 3R and never broke into the top 25 either.

 

Sakkari is a perfect example. Not making it to Top 200 in juniors at 16 really means there's no point in playing it any longer.
The best girls retire from juniors at around 16 after reaching Top 5/winning GS, defending a GS title in juniors isn't impressive at all, it just means you are stuck there for too long and not really successful on pro circuit.

 

^twas a good read tho 😂😂😂

 

must be hard to see your fav lose against such a talentless hack thrice in a year without not even winning a set

 

Surprising trivia about Maria Sakkari, her junior CHR...

And she was not a part-time participant of junior tournaments. Has anyone so low-key as junior had so much success as Sakkari currently has as a pro? I don't mean players who did not take part in official junior ITF events or hardly played in them like Kvitova, Osaka, Williams sisters.

www.tennisforum.com

Here's current top-50 WTA... sorry about my formatting skills. 35 out of 50 (or 70%) were top-50 juniors, many of them top-10.

31/5/2021 WTA		JR CHR
1	BARTY, ASHLEIGH	2
2	OSAKA, NAOMI	-
3	HALEP, SIMONA	1
4	SABALENKA, ARYNA	225
5	KENIN, SOFIA	2
6	SVITOLINA, ELINA	1
7	ANDREESCU, BIANCA VANESSA	3
8	WILLIAMS, SERENA	-
9	SWIATEK, IGA	5
10	PLISKOVA, KAROLINA	7
11	BENCIC, BELINDA	1
12	KVITOVA, PETRA	27
13	MUGURUZA, GARBIÑE	302
14	BRADY, JENNIFER	36
15	MERTENS, ELISE	7
16	AZARENKA, VICTORIA	1
17	BERTENS, KIKI	17
18	SAKKARI, MARIA	203
19	MUCHOVA, KAROLINA	-
20	KONTA, JOHANNA	20
21	VONDROUSOVA, MARKETA	1
22	RYBAKINA, ELENA	3
23	MARTIC, PETRA	26
24	KEYS, MADISON	16
25	GAUFF, CORI	1
26	JABEUR, ONS	4
27	KERBER, ANGELIQUE	37
28	RISKE, ALISON	256
29	PEGULA, JESSICA	63
30	KUDERMETOVA, VERONIKA	22
31	KONTAVEIT, ANETT	4
32	PAVLYUCHENKOVA, ANASTASIA	1
33	KREJCIKOVA, BARBORA	3
34	ALEXANDROVA, EKATERINA	925
35	BADOSA, PAULA	8
36	VEKIC, DONNA	21
37	KASATKINA, DARIA	3
38	YASTREMSKA, DAYANA	6
39	WANG, QIANG	540
40	KUZNETSOVA, SVETLANA	1
41	ANISIMOVA, AMANDA	2
42	PODOROSKA, NADIA	169
43	PUTINTSEVA, YULIA	3
44	OSTAPENKO, JELENA	2
45	LINETTE, MAGDA	23
46	ZHANG, SHUAI	71
47	SHELBY ROGERS	195
48	SEVASTOVA, ANASTASIJA	523
49	SORRIBES TORMO, SARA	33
50	COLLINS, DANIELLE	430

 

Ash...
January 2011: Plays her first junior grand slam event at the Australian Open, where she is knocked out in the opening round after losing to No.3 seed Lauren Davis.

June 2011: Wins her first junior grand slam aged 15 after defeating Irina Khromacheva in the Wimbledon final. She’s the second Australian female to win the girls’ singles event after Debbie Freeman in 1980. Following the win, Tennis Australia award Barty a wildcard into qualifying for the US Open. She was unable to qualify for the main draw after losing to Julia Glushko in her opening match.
Source...

Ash Barty’s journey from junior prodigy to the cusp of Wimbledon glory

All the key moments of the world No.1’s career as she attempts to become the first Australian woman in 41 years to win the Wimbledon singles title.

www.smh.com.au

 

How exactly is she a Junior player with an average record????


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I looked into this for a little bit here. So, of those who played fair share of juniors and did not get into top-50:

Sabalenka
Muguruza
Sakkari
Riske
Pegula
Alexandrova
Wang
Podoroska
Zhang
Rogers
Sevastova
Collins

Edit: sorry - just saw this has already been mentioned above.

 

Muguruza played just 5 junior tournaments in her career and only 2 of them offered ranking points, the other were different European team championships. Of course she did not reach the top 50. That's not "a fair share of juniors".

 

Sabine Lisicki barely made the top 100 as a junior, but managed to reach a Slam final and a ranking of #12 at the pro level.

 

I think some of Sabine's problem was shortage of money; she has said that when she was a junior there were tournaments she just couldn't afford to play in.