WTA: May 12-18 2008 Internazionali d' Italia Alice Cup Rome, ITA Tier I $1,340,000 56 players - outdoor: red clay Live Scores - in popup window WTA pdf.: draws & OOP - notes pics: WTA - Yahoo:     rome masters - italian open Rome: weather - map Rome News - Italy News #1 Justine Henin #2 Ana Ivanovic #3 Maria Sharapova #4 Svetlana Kuznetsova #5 Jelena Jankovic #6 Serena Williams #7 Anna Chakvetadze #8 Venus Williams #10 Daniela Hantuchova #11 Marion Bartoli #12 Patty Schnyder #13 Vera Zvonareva

Tourney pages: Rome: 2007 - 2006 - 2005 - 2004 - 2003 previous other tourney pages next Rome 2007: #6 Jelena Jankovic 5' 9½" 134½lb RH 2H-BH Rome 2007: 4th WTA Singles Title 2nd Tier I Clay Court Title

    The qualifying draw has been posted for Rome; the main draw is not yet available as of this writing (qualifying draws are usually up on the Friday before the tourney begins, main draws on Saturday, sometimes later). The link is above.

    The top seeds in Rome qualifying are # 34 Alize Cornet, # 44 Elena Vesnina, # 49 Pauline Parmentier and # 51 Klara Zakopalova.

    (May 5, 2008) # 3 Maria Sharapova sharply criticized WTA officials over the weekend for compelling players to participate in lengthy promotional activities without concern over the potential affect on their play.

    Maria has been required to participate in photo and video shoots prior to the Italian Open (May 12-19). Participation is also mandatory for Justine Henin, Ana Ivanovic, Jelena Jankovic and Serena Williams. The shoots are intended to result in commercials and print ads that will be part of a new worldwide WTA campaign, reportedly budgeted at $5 million for this year. Maria was originally told that the shoots, which would take place on May 11, 12, or 13, would take 5 hours. A WTA spokesman later told the press that the shoots be done in 2½ hours. Maria has been threatened with a fine as high as $700,000 if she does not attend the shoot.

    Maria said: "To ask me, or any of the other players, to do a long shoot like this is not right. Do you think the NBA would ask their top players to do a five-hour shoot the day before a playoff game?...
    "The Tour needed to challenge their agency to come up with creative that only needs 45-60 minutes of the players time, like the USTA does with their US Open Series ads. Or they could of been better prepared and did it at a tournament like Indian Wells where players arrive five to seven days early...
    "For them to threaten me with a $700,000 fine is just not right. The tour does not care what any of the players think, not just top players... The tour will say: 'We have done all these amazing things that the players wanted'. But trust me, these things they wanted as well and financially benefited from, including this shoot.
    "I want people to understand that I took this action because this is one in a long list of things that the tour has ignored the players. This is not about just one shoot, I could not just sit back anymore." Reuters story - MariaSharapova.com

---

Rome, 2007:
    On Sunday in Rome, Italy, in the final of the Internazionali d' Italia Alice Cup (aka Italian Open), 22-year-old 3rd-seeded # 6 Jelena Jankovic of Serbia (residence: Bradenton, Florida, home of the Bollettieri Academy), defeated the 2004 US Open champ (and 2006 French Open finalist), 21-year-old 2nd-seeded # 4 Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia (residence: Barcelona, Spain), 7-5, 6-1 (Jelena is shown after match point, and with the hardware).
    Jelena won the title without dropping a set in five matches, the first player to do so since Conchita Martinez in 1994--the same year Conchita won Wimbledon.
    Both players had trouble with their serve. But while Jelena was returning very well (she won 66% of her 1st serve return points), Svetlana suffered from unforced errors from the baseline. Svetlana said: "I was fighting a lot against myself. I didn't play the game I could have played."

    When Svetlana did keep the ball in play, swift Jelena often ran down and returned her would-be winners. Jelena said: "That was the key, I got so many balls back. [Svetlana is] such a powerful player. Maybe she had in her head that she had to play amazing shots...
    "I didn't expect to win like that. She's one of the toughest players on clay. She's been in the final of the French Open. I play better on hard courts...
    "I'm not putting any pressure on myself. I'm just playing and improving. Every week I'm getting better." AP story - WTA story

    Jelena will pocket $181,980 (minus whatever the Italian government takes, typically 15% to 25%--and, of course, later minus Serbia's income tax); Svetlana's prize is $92,410.

    Jelena & Svetlana had met three times before, and all three of their matches were late last year on hard courts. Outdoors at Flushing Meadows, in the 4th round of the 2006 US Open, Jelena defeated Svetlana, 6(5)-7, 6-3, 6-2. Indoor in the quarterfinals at Stuttgart Svetlana got even, 6-4, 6-1, and soon after, in the 2nd round at Linz, Sveta edged out Jelena, 7-6(6), 7-5.

    Both ladies are at career highs in this week's rankings, Svetlana at # 3 and Jelena # 5. Last week's rankings are usually displayed on these pages in order to match up with the tourney drawsheets--tourney seeds are based on the previous week's rankings.
    Jelena is now 4-5 in WTA singles finals, but 3-1 in finals this year, also winning in Charleston (on green clay) and Auckland. On Monday Jelena will move to # 4 in the rankings, another new career high.
    Svetlana is now 8-11 in WTA singles finals; she has won no titles this year, but also reached the final last week in Berlin, and earlier at Indian Wells and Doha.

---

WTA SCOREBOARD: Rome s=seed, #=rank, *=upset, LL=lucky loser ranks are for the previous week How do players get into the "draw"? Italian Open,  Rome, Italy   tourney time:        = GMT +2 hours        = US EDT +6 hours        = US PDT +9 hours Italy News Weather Forecast | Weather Maps | Weather Radar Rome: The 56-player main draw for Rome has 16 seeds, with 8 1st-round byes. There are 12 qualifiers (4 more than previous years) and 4 wild cards in the main draw.     Qualifying finals are on Sunday.   click for broader view   Tennis stadia at Foro Italico, Viale delle Olimpiadi Latitude: 41.929318 Longitude: 12.457477 goto link for World Wind 2007: On Tuesday, May 15, although unable to play due to a wrist injury, Nicole Vaidisova tried her hand at cooking up some vittles with Whirlpool gear... Roberta Vinci did likewise on Wednesday... On Monday, May 14, Russkis Dinara Safina and Anna Chakvetadze conducted a "Youth Village Tennis Clinic" at the Foro Italico.

Rome, 1st Rnd, Mon-Tue 1pm losers' prize: $3,340 US; points: 1 entry list, from data at WTA World; seeds will be based on May 5 rankings, shown below #1 Justine Henin BEL #2 Ana Ivanovic SRB #3 Maria Sharapova RUS #4 Svetlana Kuznetsova RUS #5 Jelena Jankovic SRB #6 Serena Williams USA #7 Anna Chakvetadze RUS #8 Venus Williams USA #10 Daniela Hantuchova SVK #11 Marion Bartoli FRA #12 Patty Schnyder SUI #13 Vera Zvonareva RUS #14 Agnes Szavay HUN #15 Agnieszka Radwanska POL #16 Nicole Vaidisova CZE #17 Dinara Safina RUS #18 Shahar Peer ISR #19 Amelie Mauresmo FRA #20 Francesca Schiavone ITA #21 Tatiana Golovin FRA #22 Nadia Petrova RUS #23 Sybille Bammer AUT #25 Alona Bondarenko UKR #27 Maria Kirilenko RUS #28 Virginie Razzano FRA #29 Flavia Pennetta ITA #30 Katarina Srebotnik SLO #31 Dominika Cibulkova SVK #32 Anabel Medina Garrigues ESP #33 Sania Mirza IND #35 Na Li CHN #36 Ai Sugiyama JPN #38 Caroline Wozniacki DEN #39 Karin Knapp ITA #40 Zi Yan CHN #42 Lucie Safarova CZE #43 Michaella Krajicek NED #45 Tamira Paszek AUT #47 Julia Vakulenko UKR #147 sr Samantha Stosur AUS + 4 wild cards and 8 qualifiers

Rome, 2nd Round, Tue-Wed 1pm losers' prize: $6,590 US; points: 35

Rome, 3rd Round, Thu 1pm loser's prize: $13,000 US; points: 60

Rome, QFs, Fri 1pm losers' prize: $25,650 US; points: 110

Rome, SFs, Sat 1:45pm losers' prize: $50,600 US; points: 195

Rome, Final, Sun after doubles (1:45pm) loser's prize: $99,850 US; points: 300 winner's prize: $196,900 US; points: 430

Rome, Doubles Final, Sun 1:45pm losers' prize: $29,940 US winners' prize: $59,000 US Rome, Qual Finals, Sun May 11 10am losers' prizes: q1 $865 1pt; q2 $1,700 10pts; qualifier 15 points Rome, Withdrawals

See also: QuickShop: Sporting Goods - Martina Hingis - Anna Kournikova

Current WTA Results & Tennis News (tennis home page) - 2008 WTA Schedule with links & photos

Link to many postmatch interview & match highlight videos of WTA players at the 2008 WTA Player Videos page.

WTA PhotoRankings: the current top 20 Women's Tennis rankings with player photos, links, and bio info.