Casey Dellacqua and Ashleigh Barty are a very good doubles team, but they are also two great comeback stories.
Dellacqua had suffered a terrible fall at the Beijing Open in 2015 which left her with severe concussion, and she struggled to even get through day-to-day life with her family.
She faced severe headaches and neck pain, and spent time seeing a sports psychologist to overcome the mental demons involved with such an injury, of all the other players on the WTA Tour possibly only Canada's Eugenie Bouchard knows what that's like, after suffering through her own concussion issues.
And Barty has had a breakout 2017, starting the year ranked No.271 in the world and ending it all but set to go to the Elite Trophy singles event in the Chinese city of Zhuhai next week.
Most of it can be put down to late 2016, when Dellacqua got back on the court and chose to partner with her Fed Cup teammate.
She says the thought of playing with Barty - who had only just returned to the tour herself after some time off playing cricket in the women's Big Bash League - was a big inspiration for her.
And it has all paid off, with the two qualifying as No.3 seeds for the end-of-year WTA Finals.
"I sit here now very grateful and happy that I'm back here in Singapore," Dellacqua told AAP.
"The thought of Ash coming back, that was quite exciting for me.
"It was clearly a tough time for me after the concussion but it's all in the past now.
"I'm really glad that I got through that, and to have the year that we've had with Ash has really been exceptional I think, from where we both have come from."
She says they had no expectations when they first teamed up.
"We started out the year at the Aussie Open not really too sure what to expect but we're here in Singapore and we've definitely been one of the better teams this year."
Their best result at a grand slam was when they made the French Open final, only to succumb 6-2 6-1 to top seeds Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Lucie Safarova in 66 minutes.
The pair will play eighth seeds Johanna Larsson of Sweden and Kiki Bertens from the Netherlands in their first match in the finals.
Unlike in the ongoing singles event running at the same time, the doubles is an elimination format.
Share
