Sania Mirza to miss US Open

Sania Mirza's wrist injury has forced her to miss the 2008 US Open, the final Grand Slam of the year, which starts next week.

"I've always done well at the US Open and it is very disappointing for me to miss a Grand Slam on my favourite surface due to my wrist injury," India's top woman player said in a statement.

Mirza, 21, has struggled to come to terms with her game since undergoing wrist surgery and has been advised complete rest for an initial period of 3 weeks.

The injury also forced her to retire in her first round match at the Beijing Olympics. Mirza first injured her wrist during the Indian Wells tournament in March, necessitating a surgery in Miami the following month.

Mirza dropped out of the Top 40 in July and is currently ranked 63 in the world.

Sania Mirza to keep date with Dubai

Despite bowing out with cramps during her Qatar Open match on Tuesday, Sania Mirza is expected to play at the Tier-II tennis tournament in Dubai next week.

The Indian no. 1 had been on her way to victory over Olga Govortsova of Belarus, but could barely keep herself from falling over while serving for the match at 5-4 in the second set.

At 2-3 in the final set, the 21-year-old Mirza fell down on the baseline and could not continue. She later withdrew from the doubles event as well.

"Thankfully, the injury is not serious. The doctors described it as cramping due to bilateral lower extremity fatigue," her father Imran Mirza told the Indian Tennis Blog.

"She should be playing in Dubai next week."

Sania had been playing her first singles match in nearly four weeks after being sidelined with an adductor muscle tear sustained during the Australian Open. During this period, her only outing on the court was in a Fed Cup doubles rubber where she helped India avoid relegation.

Karan Rastogi back in action at Delhi Challenger

Karan Rastogi, India's number three tennis player, is all set to make a comeback at an ATP Challenger tournament in New Delhi next month.

Rastogi, sidelined with a back injury during the ATP Mumbai Open in September, told the Indian Tennis blog that his back was better and he planned to play both the hardcourt challenger events in the Indian capital at the end of 2007.

The 21-year-old Mumbai resident, currently ranked 344 in the world, had won the Morocco F5 claycourt Futures in July this year.

News of Rastogi's comeback should please fans of Indian tennis, which has seen many of its stars fall prey to injury this year.

Sania Mirza finished her season early while Prakash Amritraj, Harsh Mankad and Mahesh Bhupathi are also recovering from injuries. With Sunitha Rao withdrawing from two consecutive Challenger tournaments in the US this month, speculation about another injury scare were rife.

Rohan Bopanna and Leander Paes have also not played since the Stockholm Open and the Madrid Masters earlier this month.

With the country's top players taking a break from tennis courts, the India F10 Futures in Gulbarga got more than its share of attention.

But India's second-string players, with the exception of world number 605 Sunil Kumar Sipaeya, failed to make it beyond the second round in the singles. Eighth seed Sipaeya lost to eventual champion Ivan Cerovic of Croatia in the quarter-finals.

There was better luck for India in the doubles with the second-seeded pair of Vijay Kannan and Kazakhstan's Alexey Kedryuk beating Tushar Liberhan and Rupesh Roy 6-4,3-6,10-3 in the final of the $15,000+ hardcourt tournament.

Across the border, sixth seed Ashwin Vijayragavan justified his seeding by making it to the singles quarterfinals of the Islamabad Futures. Pairing up with Korean Jeong-Han, Vijayragavan lost to home crowd favourites Aqeel Khan and Asim Shafik in a closely fought doubles semifinal 6-2,4-6,9-11.

Other Indians had little success abroad. Mustafa Ghouse lost in the singles qualifiers of the ATP Seoul Challenger before he and Israel's Dudi Sela bowed out in the opening round of the doubles event.

World number 728 Prerana Appineni also lost her opening singles and doubles encounters at the ITF tournament in Valencia, Venezuela. Down under in Traralgon (Australia), world number 359 Tara Iyer lost her singles opener and then forfeited her doubles quarterfinal match.

The action now shifts to the Pakistan F2 Futures grasscourt tournament in Lahore starting on Monday where a host of Indian players, led by Sipaeya, are in the fray.

Injury-hit Sania Mirza cuts short 2007 season

Sania Mirza has returned to India after a string of first round defeats at European tournaments compounded by a strained abductor muscle.

India's number one singles player pulled out of the WTA Generali Ladies Linz tournament starting next week and said she will not be playing any more in 2007.

"It has been a long and hard year for me, where I had to make repeated comebacks from two serious injuries and a surgery," Mirza was quoted as saying by The Times of India.

"I am mentally tired and my body is crying out for a break. I'm looking forward to a rest and then a great season next year."

Mirza, currently ranked 30 on the WTA list, had lost to lesser-ranked players in the opening rounds of the Kremlin Cup and the Zurich Open this month.

The 20-year-old ends the year with a 30-19 win-loss record on the WTA Tour having recently touched career best rankings in singles (27) and doubles (18).

Mirza reached the final of WTA Stanford in July and can boast of wins over the likes of Martina Hingis, Dinara Safina and Patty Schnyder in an injury-riddled season. A knee injury had kept her out of action in the first half of 2007 while a wrist injury forced Mirza to withdraw from Kolkata's Sunfeast Open in September.

Her best Grand Slam result for the year was a third round spot at the US Open in August - eventually losing to good friend and nemesis Anna Chakvetadze.

Four doubles titles came her way this season with victories at Morocco (with Vania King), Cincinnati (with Bethanie Mattek), Stanford (with Shahar Peer) and New Haven (with Mara Santangelo). Mirza ended the year with a 32-11 record in doubles.

India's performance at this year's Hopman Cup mixed team challenge had earned Mirza and Rohan Bopanna direct entry into the 2008 edition in January but it remains unclear whether Mirza can recover in time for the event in Australia.

A break will help Sania perform better in 2008
	Yes - no good can come of playing while injured
	No - she should have stuck around till the end
	Can't say
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