Sarah Borwell

Sarah Leah Borwell (born 20 August 1979) is an English former professional tennis player who enjoyed her greatest success in doubles.

She was the British number one in doubles.

Borwell made her professional debut in August 2002 at the ITF Circuit tournament held in Bath, England where she suffered a first round defeat.

She played four more tournaments that year and reached the quarterfinals of two of them (both on clay).

The season ended with Borwell ranked world No. 744.

She began 2003 with another quarter-final loss in January and two months later made her first appearance in an ITF tournament final, losing in straight sets to Australian Lisa McShea, 6–1, 6–4.

She notched up one more semifinal loss and another quarterfinal loss in ITF events before making her debut on the WTA Tour at the Tier III DFS Classic held in Birmingham.

She experienced a defeat in the first round of qualifying at the hands of a young future world No. 1, Maria Sharapova.

Borwell was then granted a wildcard into the qualifying event of her home Grand Slam, Wimbledon, where she was defeated in straight sets by Argentine Gisela Dulko in the first round.

She spent the rest of the year on the ITF Circuit, reaching two more semifinals (one as a qualifier), and finished 2003 ranked 349.

2004 was a year of first and second round defeats for Borwell.

She played the entire year on the ITF Circuit, reaching only one quarterfinal and one semifinal (albeit as a qualifier) and as such her year-end ranking fell 68 places to No. 417.

She made a more promising start to 2005, reaching the quarterfinals in her second ITF tournament of the season and the semifinals in her third.

She again played on the ITF Circuit until June when she was again given a wildcard into the Tier III Birmingham Classic qualifying rounds.

2005 ended with Borwell ranked 331.

In February 2006, Borwell attempted to qualify for the Bangalore Open, a Tier III tournament held in India.

She lost to Akgul Amanmuradova, 2–6, 1–6.

March saw success for Borwell as she reached the semifinals of ITF Sunderland before losing to Gaëlle Widmer, 1–6, 3–6.

This was immediately followed by her first ever title in Sheffield where she did not drop a single set en route to the final in which she defeated Nadja Roma in three sets.

Two consecutive first-round losses followed before a quarterfinal loss to Anne Keothavong in the ITF tournament held in Madras.

May saw another ITF final appearance for Borwell in Nagano where she was forced to retire after losing a close first set 7–5 to Tomoko Yonemura.

In June, Borwell had her first victory in the main draw of a WTA Tour event after being given a wildcard into the Birmingham Classic and defeating fellow Briton Melanie South in three sets.

Jamea Jackson beat her in the second round.

Two consecutive wild cards followed, the first into the main draw of the Eastbourne International (where she did not make it past the first round) and the second into the main draw of Wimbledon.

She had a shock victory here by winning her first-round match against world No. 66, Marta Domachowska, 6–3, 6–7, 6–4.

This set up a second round match against future world No. 1, Ana Ivanovic, which she lost, 1–6, 2–6.

Following Wimbledon, Borwell reached the quarterfinals of one ITF tournament that year and was beaten in the first round of qualifying of the US Open by Stéphanie Cohen-Aloro.

Her career-high doubles ranking is 65, set on 9 August 2010, and her career-high singles ranking is 199, which she reached on 10 July 2006.

Borwell was born in Middlesbrough.

She attended Nunthorpe School, where Jonathan Woodgate and Liam Plunkett were fellow students, she even shared a class and school football team with Woodgate who is a year her junior at The Avenue Primary school, where dual year classes were present.

She was a regular player for the Schools boys football team, more than holding her own and deserving her place in the team.

and Prior Pursglove College in Guisborough.

She won a tennis scholarship to the University of Houston, where she was ranked as high as #8 in the NCAA and completed a business degree.

Her father is a scout at Aston Villa F.C., and her mother coaches Mini Tennis and is a supervisor for school sports.

She managed to go one better than her previous year's appearance at the tournament by beating 16th seed Sunitha Rao in three tight sets, before losing to eighth seed Rika Fujiwara from Japan.

Another wildcard followed, but this time into the main draw of Wimbledon where her opponent in round one was American, Shenay Perry.

Despite a valiant performance in a first set tie-break (which she eventually lost 11–13) she lost the match in two sets.

The rest of her year was spent playing ITF tournaments where she reached one quarterfinal.

She did, however, beat two women ranked higher than herself to qualify for the Tier III Bell Challenge held in Quebec City, Canada in November.

She lost in the first round to Emma Laine of Finland.