Sarasota Clay Court Classic:

Welcome to the unknown:

This week, Jelena faces her first title defence of 2003 in Florida in this Tier IV event with $140,000 of prize money. Despite the event taking place in Florida (a highly well known location), the tournament website has a tradition of slackness and unreliability, which is usually likely to frustrate fans who simply just want to know the latest scores. If you really have to know the score, then you can give the tournament site a ring on 941-894-0040, or if you have any other queries, you can give them an email at info@sarasotaclaycourtclassic.com. Of course, for Jelena's matches you should be able to find consistent updates either on the message board, or in the chat room, so feel free to drop by.

Now a little about the sponsors. With the tournament being a Tier IV, it fails to pull in the regular big sponsors such as Mercedes-Benz and Fila, however, Penn, one of the regulars, have assigned themselves to sponsor the event. The Meadows country club is the host for the tournament, with Spiele and Danka also rounding off the many sponsors.

Something to cheer:

The last fortnight gave a lot of hope for Jelena fans. Jelena reached the QF of the Nasdaq100 open, and gained three straight victories. Despite losing rather unconvincingly to Kim Clijsters in straight sets, Jelena still left the tournament far happier than she was prior to its commencement.

She said, "I'm happy with this week. I had a tough start to the year and it always takes me a few matches to get going. So I was happy to get three in a row. I haven't had that in six months. So in that regards, I'm happy. I think I played my best tennis that I played the last six months, so yeah."

Now there is a sense of expectation for Jelena to come here and repeat what she did here last year. Last year Jelena was the number one seed for the first time in her professional career at this event, and, despite some injuries at the time, Jelena came up trumps and took the title without dropping a set. This year has a harder line up though, with Myskina, Schnyder and Pistolesi making up the remaining top 4 seeds.

The Draw:

1st round	2nd round	QF	SF	Final	Winner
Dokic(1)
Suarez
Hopkins
Matevzic
Majoli
Kournikova
Tulyaganova
Panova(8)
Sugiyama(5)
Martinez
Qualifier
Schett
Drake
Fernandez
Qualifier
Pistolesi(6)
Dechy(8)
Chladkova
Mikaelian
Bedanova
Perry
Tanasugarn
Cargill
`Schnyder`(4)
Dementieva(7)
Pisnik
Qualifier
Pierce
Likhovtseva
Qualifier
Loit
Myskina(2)

This is not the easiest draw for a number one seed. For analysis on Jelena's potential opponents, stay tuned to jelena-dokic.com for JM's preview.

Conclusion:

Anyone of the four potential QF opponents are capable of playing well enough to defeat the Jelena of 2003 so far (with the exception of the last two weeks). Once again, Jelena's performance lays pre-dominantly on her own shoulders. If she plays well, she should go far, if not win the whole thing, but if she semi-tanks, she could find herself at the wrong end of another early upset. With Jelena's momentum and new found confidence, I believe we can expect another strong performance this week.

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Prediction:

1RD - Jelena def. Suarez in straights

2RD - Jelena def. Matevzic in straights

QF - Jelena def. Kournikova in straights

SF - Jelena def. Sugiyama in three

F - Jelena def. Myskina in three

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