Ana Ivanovic (Photo by Clive Brunskill/Getty Images)
Will the second half of Ana Ivanovic's year live up the first half? After splitting with her coach, the Serbian bids for her fourth title of 2014 at the Bank of the West Classic in Stanford where her first-round opponent is Sabine Lisicki. The pair are meeting for the third time in 2014. Watch Ivanovic vs Lisicki live:
It's not often that a Grand Slam champion and finalist can meet in the first round of a tournament, but that's the Bank of the West Classic - and the up-and-down careers of Ana Ivanovic and Sabine Lisicki - for you and nobody's complaining when it results in a first-round match this watchable.
Ivanovic, the fifth seed in Stanford, is ranked no. 11 at the moment after her very good 2014 season, putting her 28 places above Lisicki - ranked no. 29 after a not-very-good season. Oddly enough, it's the third time in 2014 those trajectories will collide after Ivanovic and Lisicki met in Stuttgart and Wimbledon.
The question for Ana Ivanovic, really, is whether the second half of 2014 can match up to the first. The hype surrounding Ivanovic's return to form has been somewhat muted since her French Open campaign ended in a meek defeat to Lucie Safarova in the third round - admittedly, Safarova played well and her game matches up brilliantly against Ivanovic's, but the Serbian player and her team didn't seem to have come up with much of a tactical plan to counter those disadvantages, relying on executing her usual hit-and-hit-harder approach. Whether that counted towards the latest Ivanovic coaching split - she parted ways with Nemanja Kontic, who had lasted a year, after Wimbledon - it's hard to say. Kontic did seem to help Ivanovic relax more, which has been a huge factor in her strong 2014 results - titles in Auckland, Monterrey and Birmingham as well as defeats of Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova - but the lack of a real game plan was painfully evident in her losses to Safarova at the French Open and to Lisicki at Wimbledon.
Of course, Lisicki is not big on having a game plan either. A semifinalist in Stanford in 2011, it's been another injury-riddled and fairly woeful season for Lisicki with the one, magical exception of Wimbledon, where she made a decent fist of defending her 2013 run to the final and reached the quarterfinals (courtesy of defeating Ivanovic in three sets). Wimbledon aside, Lisicki has won back-to-back matches at just one tournament - Madrid - and while a healthy Lisicki should never under any circumstances be written off, as the German possesses some of the biggest and most imposing weapons on the WTA Tour, her 2014 form indicates that the scoreline in this Stanford meeting could be a lot closer to Ivanovic's 6-1, 6-3 defeat of her in Stuttgart than Lisicki's three-set win at Wimbledon.
What Ivanovic failed to do with any frequency or consistency, at that Wimbledon meeting which stretched over two days, was mix up the rhythm of play against Lisicki and disrupt the German's relentless pursuit of short balls which can be hammered for winners. Given that Lisicki plays better at Wimbledon than she does anywhere else - and that grass is not Ivanovic's best surface, Birmingham title or no - Ivanovic might not need to do that in this Stanford meeting: She comes into this match, or should do, with all the form and confidence Lisicki is lacking. On the other hand, if there is one player whose confidence is fragile, it's Ivanovic and a split with her coach might have knocked her off balance. In that case, look out for a long grueling battle of big forehands and unforced errors.
Ivanovic and Lisicki are scheduled on Centre Court in Stanford at 2.30pm (10.30pm GMT)
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