World number eight Elena Dementieva will be back at her pain-au-chocolate city as the French open begins in Roland Garros.
Seeded 6th this year, she starts her campaign on the red-hot clay of Roland Garros against Slovakian Martina Sucha. These two players have never faced before, but theoretically, Elena should advance easily, since the world number sixty three has yet to claim a win over a top ten.
Should Dementieva advance beyond the first round, her next opponent will be either American Vania King or Ukrainian Viktoriya Kutuzova, and none have ever faced Elena before.
As third round gets underway, Israli Shahar Peer poses the main threat, as the Israeli has been in excellent form lately, claiming the title in Istanbul over top seed Anastasia Myskina in a third set tiebreak. If Dementieva overcomes this difficult teenager, she might have a chance to beat Martina Hingis for the fourth time in her career, since they’re in a collision route for a fourth-round clash.
After that, and assuming she sends the Swiss Miss packing, Dementieva is almost certainly getting a showdown versus Kim Clijsters. These two have met already three times this year with Clijsters leading the series 2-1 and 10-3 overall. For the semifinals, things will get pretty tough with the semifinalist of the third quarter coming almost certainly from the quarterfinal clash between Nadia Petrova and Justine Henin-Hardenne (Petrova holds a fantastic 15-0 record in clay courts this season, including three victories with two being at the Tier I level).
In the final the possibilities are quite open with the main contenders for the finals being world number one, if she puts the pressure of home soil away, Venus Williams, Maria Sharapova, who has yet to play a clay court match this season, 2004 Roland Garros champion Anastasia Myskina and in-from Svetlana Kuznetsova. Other players to look out for are Russians Dinara Safina, who reached the final in Rome, claiming wins over Clijsters and Dementieva along the way, Maria Kirilenko and Anna Chakvetadze. From Italy, the power of Flavia Pennetta and the will of Francesca Schiavone will certainly do their best to go deep into the draw, as well as Czech teen sensation Nicole Vaidisova, who claimed her first clay-court title in Strasbourg this Sunday.
