Maria Sharapova: Queen of Rome Again

Maria Sharapova is really playing well this clay court season, winning her second clay court title, by defending her Rome crown. She won Stuttgart earlier this season.  This bodes well for her preparations for Roland Garros in a week's time.  She defeated Li Na today in a very tight three set match. 

It actually looked like Li Na was going to win it at 64 40 but never count Sharapova out, as she is well-known to fight back in her matches.  And fight back she did here!  It eventually ended in a third set tiebreak which had to be interrupted at 66 - by rain!  Imagine that!  Anyway, when they came back to resume the tiebreak two hours later, Maria quickly stamped her class and overpowered Li Na.

Finally Seeing Ana Ivanovic Play

I finally saw former French Open champion Ana Ivanovic play two nights ago in the third round of the Rome Open - and I was impressed with what I saw!  Her service was working and her groundstrokes were deadly once again.  I guess her work with her new coach is finally bringing results.  However, she really tried her best to play toe-to-toe with Maria Sharapova but Maria was just too aggressive and she was really fit.  Ana kinda faded by the third set so she really has to improve her fitness just in case she runs into players with full tanks - like Maria.

Sensational Tennis From Andreas Seppi and Stanislas Wawrinka

I was not actually planning to watch the 3rd round match between Andreas Seppi and Stanislas Wawrinka in the Rome Open because I had already seen Seppi play and win the Serbia Open a few weeks ago.  Anyhow, since I was switching between Li Na and Seppi's match, I got hooked with the Italian's match as it took a tiebreak for each set - the first set tiebreak going to Wawrinka, while Seppi took the second set tiebreak - and since Seppi was Italian - watching it became more thrilling and involving since the Rome crowd was pretty vocal about their support for their local player.

Wawrinka had six match points but never converted - and he led the third set 52 and looked set to win the match.  But Seppi had other plans and slowly regained his composure and evened it out at 55.  It eventually led to another thrilling tiebreak and yes, Wawrinka had SEVERAL match pointS at 63 but failed to convert ALL OF THEM! Finally, when Seppi got his first match point at 76, he converted immediately!

Seppi will meet Roger Federer in the quarterfinals tomorrow so let's see how the local crowd will support him.