Article by Glyn James

Moscow Preview:

Greetings, and welcome to the new look preview.  Whilst Conchita Slice will provide analysis on Jelena's performance for the tournament and on her potential opponents, I will be providing more detailed information on the tournament itself.


This week Jelena travels to Moscow for the Kremlin Cup, where she is the defending champion.  The WTA's Kremlin Cup succeeded the 'Moscow Ladies Open' in 1996, and now offers an impressive prize money of $1,224,000.  It is a Tier I tournament and is played on the fast indoor courts, which usually take a while to get used to.  The Kremlin Cup is part of the WTA's 'super nine' category, ie it is among the best nine tournaments on the schedule.  This year the directors shocked the whole world by declaring that Anna Kournikova would not receive a wild card for the tournament, and hinted that it was because she rejected to represent her country in the Federation Cup, but it now looks as though Kournikova will attend the tournament anyway.


The tournament is presented by the Bank of Moscow, and it has a wide range of sponsors: ranging from time providers to beauty salons...and the list goes on and on, but this is always the less interesting aspect of the tournament, so there's no need to say much more about it. (though if you really want to find the link for 'Nivea for Men' and such other companies then you'll find plenty of them here - http://www.kremlincup.ru/sponsors-eng.shtml )


The biggest news from the tournament already is the withdrawal of world number three Jennifer Capriati, who appears to be suffering from a fever and a sore throat.  This has caused the draw to be altered slightly, but tournament directors are usually prepared for this kind of stuff, especially with the Williams sisters on the tour.  Capriati is expected to return in time for next week's tournament in Filderstadt, Germany though.


Last year's tournament proved to be a great success for Jelena, though winning the competition this year will be tougher than ever.  Last year, Jelena was almost upset in the first round after scraping through the final set 7-5 against Lina Krasnoroutskaya.  Then came a series of straight sets victories over Fokina, Schiavone, Farina Elia, and finally the Russian Elena Dementieva.  This year, after a recent mini-slump in form, Jelena could come up against Hingis in the QF, Davenport in the SF and Venus Williams in the final.  Last week's poor performance in Leipzig wasn't considered too series since she had barely any points to defend, but this week Jelena will somehow need to re-motivate herself and dig up some much needed inspiration if she doesn't want to spiral down the rankings.  Ending the year as the #4 would be a mighty achievement especially since at the beginning of the season she set her goal as staying in the top ten.  Now the top five looks a realistic prospect, as long as she can keep her head and not drop too many ranking points.

Let's hope that smile surfaces on the young Yugoslav's face - something which we haven't seen in quite some time.

PREDICTION - Dokic will bounce back to form, but won't be good enough to capture the title.

1rd - bye
2rd - Dokic def. Coetzer in straight sets;
QF  - Dokic def. Hingis in three sets;
SF  - Dokic def. Davenport in straight sets (close first set);
F   - V. Williams def. Dokic in straight sets.

(What do you mean 'wishful thinking' ? )