Ivana beat Laisne 75 61. In the final she plays Claudia GIOVINE, a lucky loser.
This is an excellent chance for Ivana to win her second tournament title of the year (also $25k-Sarajevo). Giovine is ranked 511, with a career-high of 467. On the other hand, she has been in great form since losing in qualies, beating Anne SCHAEFER (#6 seed; career-high 161), recent top-5 junior Elena BOGDAN and Nathalie Vierin (#2 seed; career-high 103), all in straight sets.
Wow - never won a challenger, got injured and after a long break wins two titles in as many months! Well done girl
I think it's time to start playing bigger events, at least higher grades of challengers. She's obviously too good for 25k's and won't advance much anymore in the rankings playing just them. But she's still listed for next week's 25k in Trnava, where she should be seeded.
Ivana is just 30-35 ranking points from the top 200. Since she's not defending any points the rest of this year, she should easily make it, as long as she stays healthy. It could happen in just one or two tournaments.
Beyond that, it would be great if she could break into the top 100 again. She has a career-high ranking of 95 (June 2006) so she has been there before.
Ivana is the 2nd seed of Maribor 25k and plays Ungur in R1. If she plays anything like in the past few tournaments, there should be no problem with getting a nice result.
Ivana is our only girl in AO qualies (but at least we have 2 in the MD, can't remember when was the last time that happend). So:
Shenay Perry USA (3) v Melanie South GBR Ivana Lisjak CRO v Elena Chalova RUS
Misaki Doi JPN v Carly Gullickson USA
Shannon Golds AUS v Vesna Manasieva RUS (20)
It's not a horrible draw, but it's not easy either.
If she'll play at her best, she can qualify, but considering the fact that she hasn't won a match since early August I'm not optimistic. Even that one win would mean a lot, both in terms of confidence, as well as ranking points (lost in QR1 last year, so one win would get her well inside top200).
the draw is as good as it will get. however, i'm pretty sure she's losing tonight. probably a 6-1 4-6 4-6 loss, losing serve at 4-5 in the second and third sets and wasting about 20 bps
I can't see Ivana beating Perry, though I wish her the best.
Even if she loses, I'll be perfectly satisfied. A QR1 win is amazing for Ivana since, incrementally, it's worth many more points (38) than a QR2 (10) or QR3 (10) win. As it is, she only has three tournaments where she has won more points than that. And since she's only defending 2 points from last year, she'll move into the top 200, somewhere around 197.