Michaëlla Krajicek (; born 9 January 1989) is a Dutch former professional tennis player. She has won three singles and five doubles titles on the WTA Tour, as well as one WTA 125 doubles title, and 14 titles in singles and 24 in doubles on the ITF Women's Circuit. On 11 February 2008, she reached her highest WTA singles ranking of world No. 30. On 23 March 2015, she peaked at No. 23 in the doubles rankings.
Personal life Michaëlla Krajicek, born in Delft, is the younger half-sister of former world No. 4 and Wimbledon champion Richard Krajicek. She is therefore nicknamed Kleine Kraai, which means "little crow" in Dutch ("kraai" is a Dutch heterograph of the Czech origin surname "Krajicek" and has long been Richard's nickname). Austin Krajicek is her cousin.
An article in a Dutch newspaper with statements from the Fed Cup captain Manon Bollegraf caused Krajicek to stop participating for the Dutch team. Bollegraf commented on Krajicek's relationship with her coach Allistair McCaw. In April 2010, Krajicek confirmed she was in a relationship with McCaw who started as her fitness coach in 2007. In 2011, she returned in the Fed Cup team, after having resolved her differences with Bollegraf.
She lives in Prague, Czech Republic, her parents' native homeland.
In September 2013, she started dating German doubles player Martin Emmrich. They met at the combined ATP/WTA event in Rosmalen that year. One year later in 2014 at the same tournament in Rosmalen, the two got engaged on 16 June, when Emmrich proposed to Krajicek on centre court after her first-round win against Jana Čepelová; they got married in July 2015. However, they separated in mid-2017 and announced their divorce via Twitter in May 2018.
Krajicek has two sons with her partner tennis player Jelle Sels.
Career Juniors (2002–2004) In 2002, the 13-year-old Krajicek was included in the Dutch team for the Cesky Telecom World Junior Tennis final. She was the number-one-ranked junior player in Europe at the time. Krajicek led her country to victory over Poland in the final, winning both her singles and doubles matches en route to a 3–0 win for the Netherlands.
Krajicek won the first Grade-A tournament of 2003 (the Yucatán Cup in Mexico), making it her fourth victory in the seven tournaments she had entered. Her record stood at 33–3.ITF Tennis – Juniors – News Article Krajicek won her second Grade-A tournament at the Italian Open taking her to the No. 2 ranking in the world. At the French Open Krajicek lost in the semifinals to Vera Douchevina and reached the final of the doubles with Kateřina Böhmová, losing to Marta Fraga Pérez & Adriana González Peñas in straight sets. Prior to Wimbledon, Krajieck was expected to be one of the main challengers but she lost a three set match 6–8 in the third to Anna Chakvetadze, which ended at 8.50 pm. She got to her second successive Grand Slam junior doubles final with Böhmová, but they lost to scratch pairing Alisa Kleybanova & Sania Mirza in three sets. At the US Open, Krajicek was the favourite, alongside recent Wimbledon winner Kirsten Flipkens. The draw went to form and they met in the final, with Flipkens winning 6–3, 7–5. Krajicek was in tears afterwards and said that she was happy to reach the final but blamed the loss on tiredness and inferior conditioning.ITF Tennis – Juniors – News Article In September, Krajicek was named in the Dutch Junior Fed Cup team, a competition the Netherlands had not won since 1990. Despite a persistent nosebleed which threatened her to retire in the semifinals Krajicek was undefeated throughout the tournament as the top-seeded Dutch team won, beating Canada 2–1 in the final. She needed a win in the final event of the year to end 2003 the No. 1 junior in the world but lost in the second round of the Orange Bowl International to Neha Uberoi. She ended the year ranked No. 2 behind Flipkens.
Krajicek had a knee injury at the beginning of 2004 and did not play until late February. At the French Open Krajicek & Böhmová finally won their first Grand Slam Junior Doubles title, beating Irina Kotkina & Yaroslava Shvedova 6–3, 6–2. Krajicek had lost in the quarterfinals of the singles to Timea Bacsinszky 6–8 in the third set. At Wimbledon, Krajicek reached the semifinals of the singles and doubles, losing to eventual champion Kateryna Bondarenko in the singles and alongside new doubles partner Shahar Pe'er falling to Victoria Azarenka & Olga Govortsova. It was at this point that Krajicek started playing ITF tournaments on a regular basis.
After winning Satellite tournaments in Brussels in July and Koksijde in August, Krajicek built on these successes by finally winning her maiden singles Junior Grand Slam at the US Open. She beat Jessica Kirkland 6–1, 6–1 to go one step further than the previous year and become the first Dutch winner of the event in ten years (when Sjeng Schalken won the boys' in 1994). In October, Krajicek qualified for her first WTA Tour event in Luxembourg but she lost to No. 8 seed Shinobu Asagoe in the first round proper. She won another ITF tournament in Stockholm, then beat her first top-100 player (Slovak Ľudmila Cervanová) as well as her Wimbledon conqueror Bondarenko en route to the semifinals of the tournament in Poitiers. She followed that up with a win in Bergamo (a tournament) and ended the year ranked No. 429 in the world in the WTA rankings and was the 2004 ITF Junior World Champion, ending the year No. 1 in the world for juniors. She had a 41–6 record in singles and was the first Dutch player to become junior world champion. Her record in seniors was 26–4, winning 26 of her last 28 matches, capturing four ITF titles in the year. Her record on hard courts was 16–2, clay was 10–1, and she lost her only match on grass.
2005 At the age of 16 Krajicek qualified for her first Grand Slam event, the Australian Open. She beat three opponents ranked higher than her to qualify, then beat top-100 player Stéphanie Foretz in straight sets before losing in the second round to No. 12 seed Patty Schnyder. In February she won her first ITF tournament in Urtijëi, beating No. 51 in the world Martina Suchá in the last 16. Three months later, Krajicek reached her first doubles final on the WTA Tour, the Estoril Open partnering Henrieta Nagyová.
Now ranked No. 114, she qualified for her second successive Grand Slam (the French Open) without dropping a set but unfortunately drew the No. 20 seed Daniela Hantuchová in the first round and lost to the Slovak 3–6, 1–6. A consolation was that her performance in qualifying had made her a top-100 player for the first time, ranked No. 99. After the French Open, Krajicek received three wild cards into Wimbledon. She intended to play in both the women's doubles and mixed doubles (together with her brother Richard). However, she was injured during the Rosmalen Open just a week before the start of Wimbledon, and had to withdraw.
Krajicek returned to play in October by qualifying for the Tier II event in Luxembourg, but a week later, Krajicek won her first WTA event by winning the Tashkent Open. She beat Akgul Amanmuradova in the final. It was the first WTA tournament win for a Dutch female in eight years, after Brenda Schultz-McCarthy won the Bell Challenge in Quebec. Three weeks after that in Hasselt, she beat Anna Chakvetadze, Lucie Šafářová and the No. 13 in the world Nathalie Dechy on her way to the semifinals where she lost to Francesca Schiavone.
She ended the year ranked No. 58 in the world with a 30–10 playing record. She went 17–5 on hardcourts, 6–4 on clay, 2–1 on grass and 5–0 on carpet.
2006 She started the year by qualifying for the Hopman Cup tournament in Perth with Peter Wessels where the duo went all the way to the final to be beaten in a very close mixed doubles by the American team of Taylor Dent and Lisa Raymond. She won three out of her five singles matches (def. Lisa Raymond, Gisela Dulko and Anna-Lena Grönefeld; lost to Samantha Stosur and Peng Shuai). In mixed doubles, they had a 3–2 record (def. Reid/Stosur, Peng/Sun, Grönefeld/Kiefer; lost to Raymond/Dent, Dulko/Gaudio).
A week later, Krajicek won her second WTA title in Hobart only dropping one set en route to the final, where she beat her practice partner Iveta Benešová 6–2, 6–1. This win put her inside the top 50 to a career-high ranking of No. 43 entering the Australian Open. At the Australian Open Krajicek reached the third round for the first time ever in a Grand Slam tournament. In the first round she beat Kristina Brandi and in the second she defeated 32nd seed Sania Mirza of India. However, she retired from her third-round match against Amélie Mauresmo, after suffering from heat exhaustion.
The clay-court season was not a successful one, despite a semifinal appearance at the İstanbul Cup where she lost to Anastasia Myskina in straight sets. This was the only real highlight on clay for Krajicek in 2006 as she lost in the first round of the French Open in straight sets to No. 7 seed Patty Schnyder. This led her to drop out of the top 50, but that was only briefly as in the warm up for Wimbledon she won her third career title (and second of the year) in 's-Hertogenbosch (her brother Richard was one of the tournament organisers). In the semifinal she beat a top-10 player for the first time in what she described as the best match of her career, overcoming top seed (and No. 8 in the world) Elena Dementieva in three sets. She beat Dinara Safina in the final, but could not continue her form into Wimbledon though, losing in the first round to Australian doubles expert Sam Stosur.
Post-Wimbledon Krajicek won two successive Tier IV doubles tournaments on clay with Janette Husárová in Palermo and Budapest, the latter where she also got to the semifinals in singles competition. Thereafter the hardcourt season was not a productive one for Krajicek, losing in the first round of four successive tournaments, including the US Open where she lost 3–6, 0–6 to the eventual winner Maria Sharapova.
Krajicek ended the year ranked No. 35 in the world, she had a 27–18 record, 14–9 on hardcourts, 8–7 on clay, 5–1 on grass and 0–1 on carpet. She was 1–5 against top-10 opponents.
2007
Krajicek's 2007 season did not start as strongly as her 2006 one did as she lost 6–3, 1–6, 0–6 to Séverine Brémond in the first round of the Hobart International, where she was the defending champion. She was then defeated in straight sets by Luxembourg's Anne Kremer in the first round at the Australian Open. The inability to defend the previous year's points dropped her ranking dramatically as she entered Paris ranked No. 70 in the world. After being dumped out of the first round in Paris in straight sets by Dinara Safina, Krajicek proceeded to lose in the second round of four successive tournaments. Her best result on clay prior to the French Open was a quarterfinal run in a Tier I tournament in Charleston. Krajicek beat both top seed Nicole Vaidišová and Sybille Bammer in three sets, before losing to Vera Zvonareva.
At the French Open she made the third round, beating local favorite and 31st seed Séverine Brémond followed by Shenay Perry before losing to No. 8 seed Serena Williams. As the No. 31 seed at Wimbledon (but ranked outside the top 40 for not defending points in 's-Hertogenbosch), her skills on the grass shone through as she defeated Tzipora Obziler, British wildcard Katie O'Brien, world No. 7 Anna Chakvetadze and Laura Granville en route to her very first quarterfinal showing at a Grand Slam. In her quarterfinal match, she was defeated by 18th seed and eventual finalist, Marion Bartoli, in a rain-affected three-set match.