Russian world No.2 Maria Sharapova has closed the gap to world-leading Victoria Azarenka in the latest WTA rankings published Monday.
Sharapova beat the Belarusian 6-1, 6-4 in the final of the Stuttgart Grand Prix on Sunday, taking her 25th career WTA title and handing Azarenka her second defeat of 2012.
The win helped Sharapova to cut Azarenka's lead from 1,050 to 740 points, increasing the Russian’s chances of regaining the top spot for the first time since May 2008.
Russian No. 2 Vera Zvonareva held onto 10th place in the rankings as the top ten was unchanged.
Fellow Russians Maria Kirilenko, Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and Svetlana Kuznetsova climbed up one position each, moving to the 20th, 22nd and 26th places respectively.
Nadia Petrova dropped a place to 35th, while Ekaterina Makarova held steady at No. 39.
In the men’s ATP rankings, world No. 2 Rafael Nadal closed the points gap to Novak Djokovic after beating the Serb in the final of the Barcelona Open.
United States player John Isner returned to the top ten after a week’s absence, ousting Argentina’s Juan Martin del Potro from the No. 10 spot, although he was unable to regain the U.S. No. 1 position from Mardy Fish, who stays ninth.
Russian four-time Grand Slam semifinalist Nikolay Davydenko lost 16 positions and is now ranked 56th.
Mikhail Youzhny remains the highest-ranked Russian at 36th, while 41st-ranked Alex Bogomolov Jr. profited from Davydenko’s fall to retake the country’s No. 2 spot.
