Friday Report

By Barry Wood

She'd had a tough match against The Kid, the Australian Open junior champion Ksenia Pervak, the previous evening, and that probably had some effect on second seed Caroline Wozniacki today as she slumped to a 6-4 6-1 defeat at the hands of the eighth seeded Slovak, Magdalena Rybarikova. You probably don't know much about her, yet, but Magdalena has made a great start to the year. The PTT Pattaya Open is already her second semi-final of the season, after she reached the same stage in Hobart. And she beat a really good player there too, in 13th-ranked Flavia Pennetta. Now she's gone one better with Caroline, who is ranked 12. By the way, she's tall and blonde and willowy, just like her compatriot Daniela Hantuchova.

It's a little unusual to play the last match one day and the first match the next, but she was off the court by around 9.30pm last night and didn't have to play until 3pm today, so she couldn't really complain. And she didn't really. Just expressed her surprise. She's a very nice young lady and acts with decorum and doesn't rant and rave and swear at officials like some I could name but won't, to protect the guilty.

What happened was this. Wozniacki lost her serve in the first game, although it was to a steaming forehand winner down the line. Might have been the best shot of the match, actually. A good way for Rybarikova to start. Then Wozniacki had four break points in the next game but couldn't convert them. That was fairly crucial to the outcome, probably, as it allowed Rybarikova to retain the upper hand. As she did for the rest of the match. In fact she held break points in two more games of the first set, but Wozniacki managed to hold those off.

Having lost the first set, what Wozniacki didn't want to do was drop her serve in the opening game of the second. But she did, and then she began to make more errors that were unforced rather than forced, as had been the case earlier. Another break for 4-1 and then another to clinch the match followed.

"I was a bit tired and didn't really feel the ball today, and she was serving really well and I couldn't really get the returns and I just felt that anything I was doing wasn't really going my way. It just didn't work out the way I wanted it to," said the disappointed Dane.

Rybarikova was justifiably pleased with herself, saying, "I played very aggressive and my serve was very good, and also my volleys. It was very important to serve well because she has good returns. I think it was my best play this year."

In the other quarter-finals, Vera Zvonareva defeated Shuai Peng pretty comfortably, 6-2, 6-3. She now plays Shahar Peer, who could have beaten Vera Dushevina in straight sets after winning the first and having a break point for 5-4 in the second. Instead, she won 6-4 4-6 6-2. And Sania Mirza held off an very strong performance from Tamarine Tanasugarn to win 7-5 6-4.

No-one can ever accuse Tammy of not trying, and the way she kept herself in the rallies was very impressive. But Mirza was hitting some fine returns and was perhaps a little more powerful in the rallies. It was a good win for the Indian, who is playing only her second tournament since the Olympics last August because of an injured wrist.

Someone else will write for you tomorrow, because I have to go to Dubai. Everyone has to be somewhere.