January 2008 - Anastasia Pivovarova
by Nick Fishpool |
 | | Anastasia Pivovarova |
This month we are featuring Anastasia Pivovarova. This 17-year old Russian competed in two tournaments during the month and won one title. Both tournaments were on a hard court surface and held in USA.
The first tournament, which was held in St. Leo – Tampa Bay, Florida, USA, saw Anastasia seeded 6 and facing American qualifier Julia Cohen in the opening round. This match ended with a straight sets, 75 64, victory for Anastasia. Another qualifier, Kristina Kucova of Slovakia, provided the opposition in the second round. Anastasia edged a close match against Kristina in three sets to win 75 46 64 to move into the quarterfinal and a meeting with Argentina’s Betina Jozami. In the match with Betina, Anastasia had to come from behind to win after dropping the first set to eventually record a 36 63 62 victory. In the semi final, Anastasia came up against the number 7 seed, Corinna Dentoni from Italy, who was also her doubles partner at this tournament. As in the previous round, Anastasia lost the opening set 63 before cruising through the next two sets with the loss of just three games. Following this 36 61 62 win, Anastasia found herself in the 6th singles final of her ITF Pro Circuit career. She could feel rather confident going into the final against yet another qualifier, Audra Cohen from USA, as she had won the previous three singles finals, albeit it on clay courts rather than hard, in which she had played. A close first set of this final finished 64 in Anastasia’s favour. Now just one set from claiming the title she upped her game and took the next set 60 to take the title. This was Anastasia’s 5th singles title of her ITF Pro Circuit career to date and her first title on a hard court. Also, this was her first appearance in an ITF Pro Circuit singles final outside of Europe. Anastasia partnered by Corinna Dentoni in the doubles event here reached the final but ended up losing the deciding set on a match tiebreak 10-7.
The next tournament for Anastasia took place in Surprise, Arizona, USA. On this occasion she was unseeded and her first round opponent was Varvara Lepchenko, the number 1 seed for this tournament. Not put off by facing the top seed she came through with relative ease, 62 62. Corinna Dentoni who was Anastasia’s doubles partner and also singles semi final opponent in Tampa Bay was her second round opponent here in Arizona. As before, Anastasia defeated Corinna, this time in straight sets 62 76(1), and moved into the quarterfinal round. Allie Will, an American who came through the qualifying event was then defeated 64 63 and Anastasia faced another American in the semi final, the number 8 seed, Angela Haynes. Angela won this semi final encounter in two close sets, 63 75 and was the eventual tournament runner up.
The release of the WTA rankings on February 4th revealed that Anastasia had reached a career high ranking of 183. If she can build upon the great start she has made to 2008 so far then she can soon expect to be pushing for a place in the top 100.
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