Article by Gerhard Grundhammer

26 year old Chanda Rubin, defeated Eleni Daniilidou and Jelenas double partner Nadja Petrova in straight sets, to reach the semifinals of Linz, the tournament she has won her first wta-title at, back in 1997.

Chanda became a professional tennisplayer at the age of 15, and though she has never been a steady top10 player, she always managed to produce a few good results to stay in the top 50. The american no 6 and worlds no 14 won 5 wta tournaments in her 11 years lasting career, and her biggest success has probably happened at Los Angeles as she beat Davenport, S.Williams and J.Dokic to win her most important title.

2002 started as bad as it can start for the girl from Louisiana / USA. She could not play at all until April following a left knee surgery. But what a comeback she had. First she played two rather poor tournaments at Rome and Berlin, but then she reached the final of Madrid (lost to Seles), the fourth round of Roland Garros (lost to V.Williams) and the fourth round of Wimbledon (lost to S.Williams). In between of those two Grand Slams she won her fourth title at Eastbourne. After that great run she played at San Diego where she only lost to Davenport at round 3 in three sets, and won the tournament of L.A.

Montreal was rather disappointing for the former no6 of the world, but at the US-Open she managed to reach the third straight fourth round at a Grand Slam. Only the indoor season doesnt look very promising for Chanda. She had first round losses at Filderstadt and Zurich.

Though the right-handed player is only 1.68 meters she likes to attack from the very beginning of the match. Her serve is not that fast, but she uses a lot of spin with it, and forces her opponents to return from outside the court, so she has an open court for her next shot. But fortunately Jelena is one of best returners of the world, and so it will be an interesting match. Also interesting is the fact that both players use the same racquet, the Head intelligence i.S6, though they have a completely different game.


Both players met twice in their career. That was at Zurich last year, as Jelena had her brilliant run with 5 finals in 2 months, and Jelena won 6-4 and 6-4. Next they met at Los Angeles where Chanda beat a Jelena Dokic, who has been crying just before the match as her father told her HIS plans for HER future over the phone..... Jelena was just mentally not on court, and the match was actually over, before it started. Amazed about her 6-0 and 6-2 win over the no 4 of the world, Chanda told at the press-converece after that match, how happy she was to reach the finals, how good she has played, what she`s done right to defeat dokic, and basically that she is just the better player.

The first part of Jelenas answer was given at Los Angeles the next day: "I dont know why she`s saying things like that. We played before and I beat her, you know. She knows what i can be like, and that i havent been able to compete today." The second part of Jelenas answer should follow tomorrow atv6.30 pm local time, which is 5.30 pm in London and 12.30 pm in New York.