80042561-6714-42CD-B9EA-71B5262036A1
By Richard Pagliaro
© Tony Chang/Chang Photography
(July 28, 2010) In the ongoing tennis turf war there's a constant clash between protection and pursuit; a rally between the player you are and the one you aim to become.
The baseline will be a defining line when defending champion Marion Bartoli takes on Ana Ivanovic for a spot in the Bank of the West Classic quarterfinals.
It's a match between two hard hitters who prefer to hug the baseline and play first-strike tennis from the back of the court.
The tennis treadmill seemed stuck in reverse for former World No. 1 Ivanovic, who has won back-to-back matches at just two of the 10 tournaments she's played this season, reaching the semifinals at Brisbane in her first event of the season and advancing to the Rome semifinals in May.
With her confidence in tatters and game leaking errors, Ivanovic watched her ranking fall to No. 63 and was denied a Rogers Cup wild card.
She may have taken the first steps toward turning the corner in Monday's 6-3, 6-2 win over Alisa Kleybanova on Monday night.
"I played well," Ivanovic said. "I moved really well. I served well. I didn't make many mistakes. I'm really happy to see the few things that we worked on in the past month come to play today."
The 26th-ranked Kleybanova had won three of her prior four matches with Ivanovic, including a 6-3, 6-0 thrashing she administered in the second round of the French Open.
That loss left a frustrated Ivanovic reeling and questioning herself. She admits festering frustration and consuming fears often turned to tears after she fell out of the top 50 for the first time in two years earlier this season.
"It's very tough," Ivanovic said. "You doubt and you question many things. But I think also now it's a process. Now I try not to dwell too much on that and try to be in the moment."
Pumping her fist furiously in the opening set of her win over Kleybanova, Ivanovic has tried to tap into the positive emotion she once exuded on court and will need all of it against Bartoli.
Bidding to reach her third straight Stanford final, Bartoli has won 10 of her last 11 matches at the Bank of the West Classic. Ivanovic is 3-0 lifetime vs. Bartoli, including a 4-6, 7-6(5), 7-6(3) win at the 2005 Canadian Open and a 6-2, 6-4 victory in their last meeting at the 2008 Zurich event.
"The matches Ana and I have had in the past have been really, really close," said Bartoli after beating American Ashley Harkleroad, 6-1, 6-4, to raise her record to 19-11 on the season. "I'm definitely looking forward to it. I think this is great preparation for me if I want to do well at the US Open."
It's an important match on several levels.
Bartoli, who beat Jelena Jankovic, Samantha Stosur and Venus Williams in succession to collect the 2009 Stanford title, is defending 470 ranking points this week. The 14th-ranked Frenchwoman holds a lead of less than 300 points over the four women pressing at her heels in the rankings: 15th-ranked Maria Sharapova, 16th-ranked Shahar Peer, 17th-ranked Yanina Wickmayer and 18th-ranked Victoria Azarenka. All four women advanced to the round of 16.
The winner of the Bartoli-Ivanovic match will take on either the eighth-seeded Azarenka or American Melanie Oudin for a spot in the quarterfinals.
Ivanovic is aiming for her first quarterfinal since May. The 22-year-old Belgrade baseliner broke the losing cycle, for one tournament anyway, in Rome when she swept three top 20 players — Azarenka, Elena Dementieva and Nadia Petrova — in succession to reach the Rome semifinals. Ivanovic failed to build on that result, however, falling to former Fed Cup teammate Jelena Jankovic in Madrid.
Since that Rome result, Ivanovic has won three of her last seven matches and knows now is the time to rebuild her confidence by posting positive results.
If Ivanovic can get out of her own way and play with the aggressive instincts she showed when she was a top 10 player she is capable of putting together wins at some point during this US Open Series.
The question is: can she do it now when matters against the defending champion?
"I've been working very hard to try to get back. It seemed like the harder I would try, the further I was getting away from me," Ivanovic said. "I just tried to relax and be in the moment and not think too much about the result."
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