#4. Belinda Bencic
The 19-year old Swiss was considered a rising talent as a result of some promising performances she put on in 2014 and 2015 that included reaching the quarter-finals of the 2014 US Open and winning the Rogers Cup last year. The former junior Wimbledon champ whose playing style resembled that of Martina Hingis was expected to put on even more brilliant performances this year.After a disappointing opening round exit at the Brisbane International, Bencic reached the semi-finals of the Sydney International before making her first fourth round appearance at the Australian Open where she would lose to Maria Sharapova. A runner-up performance at the St. Petersburg Ladies Trophy caused her to reach the Top 10 for the first time in her career. However, this was followed by a string of poor performances at Dubai, Doha, and Indian Wells.Soon, the youngster had to deal with injuries and as a result, as she had to retire early at the Miami Open and had to miss most of the clay-court season including the French Open. Bencic had a decent start to her grass-court season by reaching the semi-finals of the Ricoh Open. However, injuries plagued her again as she was forced to retire in her opening match of the Aegon Classic and in her second round match at the Wimbledon.
Her injury struggles continued as she had to pull out of her title defence at the Rogers Cup and had dismal outings at the Cincinnati Masters and the Connecticut Open which was followed by a third round exit at the US Open. Bencic’s poor form persisted as her performance at the Asian swing was nothing but lackluster. As a result, she dropped down to 43rd in the rankings.The fact that she is only 19, we can expect Bencic to come back strong next year but she would have to work immensely on her fitness in order to do so.
