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by Prip Tina Pisnik had decided to take a break in the last couple of weeks of last year, and with good reason. Coming off an illness around the time of the U.S Open and playing very mundane tennis, the Slovenian looked to be on the same track as her compatriot Katarina Srebotnik, who was also stuck in the doldrums. This time, coach sitting in the stands, Tina looked a lot more confident. Of course, being the fourth seed and drawn against a player still struggling to reach her form after knee surgery didn't hurt. Tina jumped to a 4-0 lead in the first set before Mariana finally managed to hold serve. I'm not sure what the Argentine had come to court with in mind, as she looked like she either didn't have much of a plan or was simply not managing to pull it off. In any case, she made sure to hit the ball deep as often as she could, which is essential in playing against the talented Slovenian. Tina on the other hand was making life very difficult for herself. She constantly sliced her backhand, which didn't trouble the Argentine at all and merely served to put the ball back in play. The shot not only had little to offer in offense, hitting it also seemed to take quite a bit of energy. Her serve was also taking its time to warm up, and Mariana tried to take advantage with hard deep returns. Tina looked like she was about to give up one break of serve, with a double-fault not helping things much, but had a stroke of luck. She threw in a lousy dropshot that the Argentine got to it in plenty of time despite still sporting some tape on her knee. Mariana had the whole court open before her, but she threw her chance away when the shot she hit clipped the net and bounced back on her side of the court. The miracle gave Tina a renewed enthusiasm after a temporary period of frustration, and just escaped with her serve to go up 5-1. Tina again just managed to hold serve to take the first set 6-2. The second set turned out similar to the first except that the Slovenian was considerably more tired after all the running she was doing. Nevertheless, she was mixing her shots up enough to keep her opponent from getting much feel and rhythm. She broke serve at 1-all to go up 2-1, but promptly lost serve to bring it even at 2-all. Mariana started to play a lot less tentatively, but was still having trouble finishing off the points. She'd send Tina scrambling on the court and into defensive mode, but somehow the Slovenian would get away with the point. It must be mentioned that the Argentine had a cold, and was blowing her nose occasionally during the changeovers. That probably had quite a bit to do with the weird tennis she was playing, approaching on aggressive but just not quite getting there. Tina once again got the break to go up 3-2, and this time managed to consolidate the break. Despite getting 5 aces to her opponent's 0, Tina seemed to struggle a lot on most of her service games Mariana served to stay in the set at 5-3, but lost the match on a high volley bordering on an overhead dumped into the net. Yet another loss for the Argentine, and this would be little in preparation for the upcoming Aussie Open. Meanwhile, her compatriot Maria Emilia Salerni is already in Melbourne with her coach and ex-tennis player Mercedes Paz preparing for her first event of the year. |