Ana Ivanovic: Where From Here?
Ana Ivanovic seemed to be hitting her stride and establishing her place at or very near the top of women’s professional tennis when she won the 2008 French Open title and became the Number One ranked player. Ivanovic had been steadily rising through the rankings in the previous couple years. Ana had already reached two other Grand Slam finals, i.e. 2007 French Open losing to Justine Henin and 2008 Australian Open losing
to Maria Sharapova. At the same time, Ivanovic’s popularity was soaring due to her strong tennis results and striking good looks. After winning the French Open, it really seemed as if Ana Ivanovic “had arrived.” However, in the ensuing four months, Ivanovic has had a very rocky road and her ranking has slipped as her game has faltered and her confidence disappeared. Ivanovic was upset early at Wimbledon by Jie Zheng and then hurt her thumb during the summer and suffered an early upset in Montréal and then had to pull out of the Beijing Olympics. At the 2008 U.S. Open, Ivanovic was apparently finally healthy again, but she played very poorly in losing a tight early round match. Since then, Ivanovic has continued to struggle in September and October losing early in Tokyo, Beijing and Moscow. The 2008 season is almost over with only a couple tournaments left before the season-ending Sony Ericsson Championships in Doha in early November. Ivanovic clearly needs to “right the ship” quickly before her own self-belief suffers even more and her locker-room reputation erodes even further. Ironically, veteran and two-time Grand Slam champion, Amelie Mauresmo, is in a similar situation. Their games have not disappeared because of injuries and although lack of practice may have hampered their preparations for past tournaments, they’ve both had enough practice and tournaments to be winning more matches. The real challenge is in the mind… self-doubt causes even the most talented tennis pros to lose matches that they used to routinely win. Ivanovic (and Mauresmo) needs to find her internal self-belief again and trust her talent and game, especially in the tight moments.
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