Ana Ivanovic is relishing the pressure of being world number one and top seed for Wimbledon.
Ivanovic took over top spot in the world rankings with her French Open triumph earlier this month and is among the favourites to make it back-to-back grand slam titles at the All England Club.
The Serbian star is just 20 years old but - speaking ahead of her second-round clash with France's Nathalie Dechy on Court One - claimed she is only taking the positives from her newly-elevated position.
"Obviously, there are different ways of dealing with pressure," said Ivanovic, who lost just three games in her opening victory over Rossanna De Los Rios.
"Becoming number one, it takes more pressure, but also you have to see pressure for what it is. It's a reflection of your own ambition.
"If you see it as a positive thing, it means that you put yourself in a position to do something memorable. So if you look at it that way, it can be very motivating."
Former champion Serena Williams was also in action on day three, the sixth seed facing a potentially-tricky encounter with Poland's Urszula Radwanska.
Elder sister Venus yesterday enjoyed a straight-sets victory over Britain's Naomi Cavaday, although the four-time winner had to come back from 3-1 down in the opening set in the 7-6 (7/5) 6-1 win.
"I thought she played excellent. She took her chances, really took advantage of her opportunities and played with poise on this occasion, Centre Court in front of a home crowd,"," said the 27-year-old seventh seed.
"I thought she did really well with that. She served well and really returned the ball with force and ran a lot of balls down, so I was impressed with her game.
"I felt that my level was good. I think it's nice to have a really challenging opponent early on, especially having not played since the French Open."
Two more former champions also advanced to the second round, Maria Sharapova easing through in straight sets against French qualifier Stephanie Foretz and Lindsay Davenport battling past Renata Voracova in three sets.
Davenport missed Wimbledon in 2006 through injury and announced her retirement in December that year after learning she was pregnant with her first child.
However, the American returned to the tour in 2007 after the birth of son Jagger and is back at the All England Club for the first time in three years despite suffering from a knee injury which forced her to withdraw from the warm-up event at Eastbourne last week.
"Jagger travels with me and it's obviously more of a challenge than life used to be just because there's always something going on and to look after him," the 32-year-old said.
"But we have a great time. He's a lot of fun to hang out with. There's a lot of downtime when you're on the tennis tour. He definitely occupies my time.
"I did not think I would be back here at Wimbledon, it's a real treat, a real honour and privilege. I'm real excited to be back here and be able to play.
"I've had some of my greatest memories here. What started off as a grand slam that I probably liked the least definitely turned into one I liked the most in the latter part of my career."
One match suspended by bad light last night saw number five seed Elena Dementieva on course to progress to round two against Italy's Maria Elena Camerin.
The Russian led 6-3 3-3, with game seven of the second set yet to get under way. more details
No comments:
Post a Comment