tsvetana pironkova tennis star

Pironkova was born in 1987 to Kiril Enchev Pironkov, a former canoeing champion and Radosveta Chinkova Nikolova, a former swimming champion. She started playing tennis at the age of 4, when her father Kiril introduced her to the game. At the age of six, she started playing in junior tournaments in Bulgaria. She achieved her career high of world no. 31 on 13 September 2010. She is best known for defeating Venus Williams three times at Grand Slam tournaments. She is currently the Bulgarian No. 1 and has won six ITF titles in her career.
August 2002 at the age of 14, Pironkova played her first professional tournament at the $10,000 International Tennis Federation Tournament in Bucharest, Romania. Pironkova won 3 qualifying matches before reaching the final in the main draw, where she lost to Monica Niculescu of Romania, 6–1, 7–6(1).
In September 2002, Pironkova played in the $10,000 ITF event in Volos, Greece, where she lost only one set playing through the qualifying and main draw. She defeated Tina Schmassmann of Switzerland 7–6(3), 7–5 to win her first professional ITF event.
14–21 May 2005, at the age of 17, Pironkova played in her first WTA level tournament, the Tier III event in Istanbul, Turkey. After winning two qualifying matches, Pironkova won three matches in the main draw before she lost in the semi-finals to Venus Williams.
In January 2006, Pironkova made headlines by defeating tenth-seed Venus Williams in the first round of the 2006 Australian Open by a score of 2–6, 6–0, 9–7. Pironkova was ranked 94th in the world. She lost to Laura Granville in the second round.
In the first round at Wimbledon, Pironkova came from a set down to defeat then top 20 player Anna-Lena Grönefeld 3–6, 6–3, 6–1. In the following round she lost to Agnieszka Radwańska in straight sets.
At the Australian Open, the 20 year old thrashed Olga Govortsova in the 1st round 6–1, 6–1. In round 2 she played second seed Svetlana Kuznetsova. Despite leading 5–2 and having set points in the 1st set, the Bulgarian eventually lost 7–6(0), 6–2.
At the Tier II Proximus Diamond Games in Antwerp in February, Pironkova qualified for the loss of only 10 games in 3 matches, won her first round match for the loss of just two more, and then took a 7–6, 3–1 second-round lead over Belgian World No.1 Justine Henin before losing the match in three sets.
She caused another upset at the 2008 Rome Masters. As a qualifier, she beat top seed and world no. 3 Ana Ivanović in the second round for the biggest victory of her career so far. She advanced to the quarterfinals, her first ever at a Tier I event, when Victoria Azarenka retired during their third round match with Pironkova leading 6–1, 1–0. In the quarterfinals she was defeated 6–2, 3–6, 6–1 by Anna Chakvetadze