Julia Grabher (born 2 July 1996) is an Austrian professional tennis player.[1] On 26 June 2023, she reached her best singles ranking of world No. 56. On 29 August 2016, she peaked at No. 387 in the doubles rankings. She is the current No. 1 Austrian female player.
Grabher has won one singles title on the WTA Challenger Tour, along with eleven singles and eight doubles titles on the ITF Women's Circuit.
Playing for the Austria Fed Cup team, Grabher has a win–loss record of 6–13 in singles and 2–9 in doubles (overall 8–22), as of May 2024.
Professional career
2019–20: WTA Tour debut
In October, Grabher was given a wildcard for the main draw of the 2019 Ladies Linz. She lost in the first round to Slovak player Viktória Kužmová, in straight sets.[2]
In September, Grabher won her maiden title at a WTA 125 event when she defeated Italian player Nuria Brancaccio in the final of the Bari Open, in straight sets.[4] As a result, she reached the top 100, at No. 97 on 12 September 2022. Only three weeks later, as the top seed, she would beat Aliona Bolsova and win the final of the $60k Open de San Sebastián, her third ITF Circuit title for 2022.
2023: Major, WTA 1000 & first wins, maiden WTA Tour final, top 60
Grabher made her Grand Slam debut, at the 2023 Australian Open.[5]
She then made her WTA 1000 debut at the Dubai Championships after qualifying. Also on her debut, she entered the WTA 1000 2023 Miami Open main draw as a lucky loser directly into the second round replacing top seed Iga Świątek.
She also entered the main draw at the WTA 500 Charleston Open, replacing Jeļena Ostapenko, and reached the third round defeating tenth seed Zhang Shuai, her first top-30 win, and qualifier Sachia Vickery. As a result, she moved to a new career-high ranking into the top 80 in the singles rankings.
At the Madrid Open, she won her first WTA 1000-level match as a lucky loser, defeating another lucky loser, Bulgarian Viktoriya Tomova.
At the Italian Open, she went one step further to reach the third round of a WTA 1000 event for the first time in her career, defeating wildcard Nuria Brancaccio and upsetting 26th seed Jil Teichmann.[6][7] As a result, she moved 15 positions up in the rankings, to a new career high of world No. 74, on 22 May 2023.[8]
She reached her maiden WTA Tour final at the Morocco Open in Rabat, after a retirement from top seed Martina Trevisan in the quarterfinals and a three set win over Julia Riera in the semifinals.[9] However, she lost the final to Lucia Bronzetti, in three sets.[10]
She won her first match at the French Open defeating Arantxa Rus, before losing to sixth seed Coco Gauff.[11]
In August, Grabher became the first Austrian winning a title at a $100k tournament, at the ITF Maspalomas in Gran Canaria, Spain.[12]
Performance timeline
Key
W
F
SF
QF
#R
RR
Q#
DNQ
A
NH
(W) winner; (F) finalist; (SF) semifinalist; (QF) quarterfinalist; (#R) rounds 4, 3, 2, 1; (RR) round-robin stage; (Q#) qualification round; (DNQ) did not qualify; (A) absent; (NH) not held; (SR) strike rate (events won / competed); (W–L) win–loss record.
To avoid confusion and double counting, these charts are updated at the conclusion of a tournament or when the player's participation has ended.
Only main-draw results in WTA Tour, Grand Slam tournaments, Fed Cup/Billie Jean King Cup, Hopman Cup, United Cup and Olympic Games are included in win–loss records.[1][13]
^Edition is split into the two years due to COVID-19.
^The first Premier 5 event of the year has switched back and forth between the Dubai Tennis Championships and the Qatar Ladies Open since 2009. Dubai was classified as a Premier 5 event from 2009 to 2011 before being succeeded by Doha for the 2012–2014 period. In 2015, Dubai regained its Premier 5 status while Doha was demoted to Premier status. The Premier 5 tournaments were reclassified as WTA 1000 tournaments in 2021.
^ 4.04.14.24.3During the season, she did not play in the main draw of any tour-level tournaments. However, she played at the Billie Jean King Cup, which is not counted as a played tournament but matches counted.