[jiffster]

Difficult draw indeed. A win over Erakovic seems possible...over Venus is unlikely...over Sharapova almost impossible. Still it would be nice to see her compete well and play tough to build her confidence for the year ahead.

[jiffster]

A marathon 3 1/2 hour win down under for Alize, 7-5, 6-7, 10-8. I didn't see the match, but the stats show only 8 unforced errors in three long sets which is pretty promising. She apparently saved a set point in the first set. Venus won easily and will be her next opponent. Allez!

[Dorien.]

Alizé
Happy she could win such a fight

[Sombrerero loco]

yeah, imagine if she loses this one after losing to niculescu last year in another drama match

[jiffster]

Venus beat Alize 6-3, 6-3 in the first stadium night match. Watching the match highlights, it looks like Alize was competitive. She went up 2-0 in the first set, but was broken in three of the next four service games and lost the set. They were on serve at three all in the second set when Venus took control. Next up for Venus is Sharapova, who looks to be in dominant form. On paper this looks likes a great match, but I think Sharapova comes through without too much difficulty.

Alize is playing doubles with Mona Barthel. Mona's a great young player but I don't know much about her doubles talents. We will see how they do.

[Dorien.]

Excepted
Good luck in doubles

[Sombrerero loco]

next tournament will be paris-indoors

but yeah, good luck in doubles

[Pax]

I'm impressed by Alize so far. She changed her serve motion a bit maybe it will be more consistent, and changed her forehand grip. It will be good I hope. It's a hard task for her, she has to get used to it, it's a long time, so I thought she won't have huge results already in Australia.
It is good that she could win a match in Melbourne, and win a crazy match like against Erakovic. It is good for her confidence. Against Venus she was good, she was a break up in the first and in the second too. I'm content with her.
She scored 160 points (last year 10 or 20) and she is very close to the top 30. Until Strasbourg every point will be a gift so I really hope she will be seeded at Roland Garros and also in Wimbledon.
I think she will be playing Fed Cup in France on indoor clay, I think she will play singles matches. Maybe she can play a good match against Kerber, won't be easy. After that Paris indoor is not her surface
And AO is not over yet, good luck in doubles!!!

A BIG QUESTION!!!! Why was Gabriel Urpi (Pennetta's coach) in Alize's box today? There were Mauresmo, Goven and Urpi. What does it mean? Now Pennetta is training in Barcelona...

[Alizé Molik]

Not sure on the coach question but watching both these matches you could see that they have tried to put more weight on the forehand. It is still producing a lot of stupid errors on routine balls so that really needs to be worked on. If you are going to play the game Alize does you need to not make so many errors. Serve looked like it had more on it too. I'm not too concerned about the apparent "ugliness" of the forehand that people claim. if Alize could get close to a Justine Henin type game that works I would be really happy. I feel like she needs to play a schedule similar to her 2008 one that worked so well and propelled her into the top 20.

[Lighter]

Originally Posted by Pax

I'm impressed by Alize so far. She changed her serve motion a bit maybe it will be more consistent, and changed her forehand grip. It will be good I hope. It's a hard task for her, she has to get used to it, it's a long time, so I thought she won't have huge results already in Australia.
It is good that she could win a match in Melbourne, and win a crazy match like against Erakovic. It is good for her confidence. Against Venus she was good, she was a break up in the first and in the second too. I'm content with her.
She scored 160 points (last year 10 or 20) and she is very close to the top 30. Until Strasbourg every point will be a gift so I really hope she will be seeded at Roland Garros and also in Wimbledon.
I think she will be playing Fed Cup in France on indoor clay, I think she will play singles matches. Maybe she can play a good match against Kerber, won't be easy. After that Paris indoor is not her surface
And AO is not over yet, good luck in doubles!!!

A BIG QUESTION!!!! Why was Gabriel Urpi (Pennetta's coach) in Alize's box today? There were Mauresmo, Goven and Urpi. What does it mean? Now Pennetta is training in Barcelona...

Gabriel Urpi is the new coach of french fed cup team. Amélie proposed him to work with her and he agreed in august 2012. So, he already worked with all the french top players except Marion during 3 weeks last november and last december.

[jiffster]

Alize lost a close doubles match and is out of the AO, 7-6, 4-6, 7-5. She started working to improve her serve last year, and I hope that trend continues. Happy to see she is also focused on improving her forehand, I think the past few years she has hit her forehand off the back foot way too much. It may work on clay against mid level opponents, but she's not going to beat any top players on any surface unless she can add a strong flat forehand. When she is playing with confidence, that shot can be a weapon and she does not have too many of those. If she can continue to improve her serve, I would like to see her come to the net a bit more and not always be glued to the baseline. Not many points to defend until March, so getting back to top 30 is possible with a strong run in a few tourneys.

[Dorien.]

Alizé her part of the draw:

Dominika Cibulkova vs BYE
Lucie Hradecka vs Tamira Paszek
Sofia Arvidsson vs Alize Cornet
Lourdes Dominguez Lino vs Lucie Safarova

Not a bad draw. Hopefully she can win at least a match

[Sombrerero loco]

OMG arvidsson again, i cant anyway, good luck, should be winnable yeah

[jiffster]

Alize beat Arvidsson 6-3, 4-6, 6-0. Next up either Safarova or Lourdes Dominguez.

[Dorien.]

Well done Alizé