The Top 10 Women's Matches Of The Decade

Ten years’ worth of memorable marathons and top-shelf tennis from the WTA’s boldest and bravest

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10. Petra Kvitova d. Angelique Kerber

7–6 (5), 4–6, 6–4

2014 Fed Cup final

> It’s fitting that the best team player of the decade would also win the best team match of the decade. In 2011, Kvitova led the Czech Republic to its first Fed Cup since 1988, and then did it five more times. The peak moment in that dominant run came in the 2014 final, when she sealed another title for the Czechs in a three-hour thriller, in front of a delirious audience in Prague.

Played on the final day of the season between two top-tier champions with starkly contrasting styles, it was a highly anticipated match that lived up to all of its possibilities. Kvitova, like a hockey player with a killer slap shot, fired rocket after rocket across the net; Kerber, like an all-star goalie, did all she could to fend them off.

Spurred on by their teams and the moment, each woman staged a desperate, unlikely comeback. Kerber trailed 0–3 in the second set before winning it 6–4. Unfortunately for her, Kvitova turned the tables in the third set, when she also came back from 0–3 and used the crowd’s support to lift her to a 6–4 win—and the Fed Cup title—on her fourth match point.

“It’s for your country,” Kvitova said, “but always when you are not feeling great and you don’t have enough energy, you always find something and I’m not sure where I found it. I’m just glad that I found it.”

Kvitova’s decade will be recalled for her two Wimbledon titles, but her ability to find it in Fed Cup, time and again, was as impressive.

9. Naomi Osaka d. Petra Kvitova

7–6 (2), 5–7, 6–4

2019 Australian Open final