Květa Peschke

Career

Prior to 2003, Peschke was known as Květa Hrdličková.

2004–2005

After a 2004 season playing primarily on the ITF circuit, in the 2005 tennis season, as one of the older players on the WTA tour, she had a successful year in both singles and doubles. In her first event of the season, she reached the quarter-finals of a Tier V event in Hobart, defeating two top players on the way in Martina Suchá and Anabel Medina Garrigues, the fifth-seeded player of the tournament. After a first round loss at the Australian Open to the number three-seeded player from Russia, Anastasia Myskina, she failed to get very far in any tournaments until April at the Tier II event in Amelia Island, reaching the last 16 after qualifying and defeating Amy Frazier, the 16th seed, before falling to the number one in the world at that time, Lindsay Davenport. Peschke again reached the last 16 at the Tier I event in Berlin, defeating the fifth-seeded and number 10 in the world, Vera Zvonareva, before losing to Justine Henin-Hardenne of Belgium in a tough three-set match, 6–4 4–6 2–6. After a disappointing second-round loss at the French Open to Israel's Shahar Pe'er and a first-round loss at S'Hertogenbosch to Russia's Maria Kirilenko, she sprung back to prominence at Wimbledon. On the way to a fourth-round appearance at the Grand Slam grass event, she defeated three players of higher ranking than herself, Dally Randriantefy, Vera Zvonareva and Conchita Martínez, a former Wimbledon champion herself. She suffered a hard loss in the last 16 to Nadia Petrova of Russia in three sets, 7–6 6–7 3–6. Towards the end of the season she did have some success at two key tournaments; she reached her first semi-final of the year at a tier II event in Linz, defeating two number two seeded Russian, Elena Dementieva, Vera Zvonareva and Japan's Ai Sugiyama. She also reached a quarterfinal at another Tier II event in Philadelphia before losing to Elena Dementieva in three sets, 6–4, 0–6, 3–6.

2006

Her 2006 season, however, was not as successful. She reached the second round of only five tournaments, suffering a crushing 14 first-round losses at WTA Tour events. However, she did manage to reach the semi-finals of a Tier II event at Luxembourg in late September. In this tournament she picked up a straight-set victory over Dinara Safina of Russia and lost in a tight three-set match to Ukraine's Alyona Bondarenko 3–6, 7–5, 5–7.

Peschke's doubles career has been more successful, including her top 10 debut in the doubles ranking in September 2006. In 2005 she won 2 WTA tour doubles titles in Paris (Tier II) and in Linz (Tier II), reached the finals of 4 WTA tour doubles events and various other hugely successful achievements. 2006 saw an even greater rise to her doubles career, winning a further 2 WTA tour doubles titles, defending her 2005 title at Paris and winning in Dubai (Tier II). Her main successes in doubles have come at three of the four grand slams, reaching the quarter-finals of the French Open, the quarter-finals of Wimbledon and, more recently, the semi-finals of the 2006 U.S. Open, her partner being Francesca Schiavone each time, and lost in the 2006 U.S. Open mixed doubles final aside Martin Damm to Bob Bryan and Martina Navratilova.

2007

In 2007, Peschke did not play in the Australian Open. Upon her return at the 2007 French Open, she qualified for the singles main draw and upset two-time Roland Garros semifinalist Nadia Petrova in the first round, 7–5, 5–7, 6–0, and played in doubles with Rennae Stubbs as for Schiavone returned to her Australian Open doubles partner Emmanuelle Gagliardi. At the 2007 U.S. Open, Peschke and Stubbs reached the doubles semifinals, before losing to Nathalie Dechy and Dinara Safina. The Peschke-Stubbs team won their first title in Stuttgart, Germany. In the final, the team defeated Chan Yung-jan and Dinara Safina in three sets. Their second title at Los Angeles over French Open champions Alicia Molik and Mara Santangelo 6–0, 6–1, and won their first Tier I tournament at the 2007 Zürich Open, defeating former partner Francesca Schiavone and Lisa Raymond 7–5, 7–6 (1) in the final, winning their third title on the 2007 WTA Tour.

2010

Peschke partnered with Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi of Pakistan in the mixed doubles draw of the 2010 United States Open, where they defeated the fifth-seeded team of American Vania King and Romanian Horia Tecău in the first round, then beat Kazakhstani Yaroslava Shvedova and Austrian Julian Knowle to advance to the quarterfinals, dropping the first set of both matches before winning the second set and match tiebreak. In the quarterfinal round, they ousted the South American team of Argentine Gisela Dulko and Uruguayan Pablo Cuevas, again losing the first set before coming back to win the second set and match tiebreak by a wide margin. Peschke and Qureshi cruised into the final after defeating Anna-Lena Grönefeld of Germany and Mark Knowles of the Bahamas in straight sets. In the final, Peschke and Qureshi lost to Bob Bryan and Liezel Huber in a straight 6–4, 6–4. However, doing so she has won the hearts and minds of millions of Pakistanis and has become the most favourite international female tennis personality in Pakistan as quoted by her on-court double partner Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi at the post match winning ceremony interview.

The Czech also competed in women's doubles at the Open, where she partnered with Katarina Srebotnik from Slovenia as the fourth-seeded team. Peschke and Srebotnik sent home fellow Czech Petra Kvitová and Switzerland's Stefanie Vögele by way of a brief first-round encounter, then defeated American sisters Chelsey and Carly Gullickson, but lost in the third round to another all-American team, the 15th-seeded duo of seasoned veteran Meghann Shaughnessy and late-blooming Bethanie Mattek.

2011–2012

Peschke and Slovenia's Katarina Srebotnik were one of the most victorious doubles team in 2011. In addition to the five titles the pair won in Auckland, Doha, Carlsbad, Eastbourne and Beijing, they won their first Grand Slam title at Wimbledon, defeating Sabine Lisicki and Samantha Stosur in the final.

She won two doubles titles in 2012; Sydney with Srebotnik and Linz with Anna-Lena Grönefeld.