Rome first round: After her disappointing first round loss in Warsaw two weeks ago, Nastya is trying to have a better result this week in Tier I - Rome. This will be Nastya´s second clay court tournament of the year. The Russian so far has a rather sad 11-7 win-loss record in 2006.Nastya (10th seed) will meet qualifier Victoria Azarenka in round one. The Russian has won their only previous encounter this year in Miami 6-3 7-5. The 16-year-old from Belarus has a 12-7 win-loss record this year.

Round two could see Nastya playing either Sweden´s hope Sofia Arvidsson or Roberta Vinci who competes on home soil. In case Nastya makes it through round three, there could be an all-Russian encounter ahead of us with Svetlana Kuznetsova very likely to reach that stage of the draw. Daniela Hantuchova is a good bet for the quarterfinals. Kim Clijsters, Dinara Safina and Anna Lena-Groenefeld are also in the lower part of the draw but Nastya cannot meet them prior the semis.

Fellow top-seeds Venus Williams, Patty Schnyder, Nicole Vaidisova and the current clay-mistress Nadia Petrova are all in the upper part of the draw. Amelie Mauresmo as well as Maria Sharapova have withdrawn from the tournament.

Nastya vs. Azarenka will be second on Stadium Nicola Pietrangeli after a 1 pm (CEST) local time start on Monday. Good luck Nastya!

Russian Maria Sharapova has withdrawn from the Italian Masters Tournament with an injury to her right foot. The injury has bothered her for weeks, and she still hasn’t recovered. Sharapova had hopes to play the tournament as a warm up for next week’s Roland Garros.

Another withdrawal is Amelie Mauresmo. The French world number 1 withdrew with an injury she sustained on Saturday when she played Justine Henin-Hardenne in Germany at the Berlin Open.

With the withdrawal of the two players, the Rome tournament has lost their top two seeds and now Kim Clijsters is the number one seed.

Today both Venus Williams and Martina Hingis will play their matches versus respectively Zuzana Ondraskova from Czechs and Italian Sara Errani.

Martina Hingis continues her quest to regain top form in the Internazionali d’Italia in Rome beginning the week of May 15. This Tier I tournament, believed to be the most difficult of all warm-ups for the French Open, has 7 of the top 10 players in the main draw.

It is Hingis’ first time to play in Italy after 5 years. She won this tournament in 1998 and reached the semifinals in her last appearance in 2001. She enters Rome after an encouraging quarterfinal showing in Berlin, where she lost to top-seed Amelie Mauresmo in 3 sets. Her ranking will now stand at #21 after winning a few points from Berlin, but she remains to be unseeded here. Her side of the draw, considering how tough the field is, appears fair:

First round vs. a qualifier.
2nd round vs. Czech teen Nicole Vaidisova (seeded #12; a good up-and-coming player, but has not had the best results so far this season).
3rd round vs. Francesca Schiavone (very good on clay; Hingis won their last meeting in Tokyo easily) or Maria Kirilenko (Hingis beat her twice already)
Quarterfinal vs. Amelie Mauresmo (top ranked clay court specialist. Another opportunity to avenge her recent loss).
Semifinal vs. Nadia Petrova or Patty Schnyder
Final vs. Kim Clijsters, Svetlana Kuznetsova or Maria Sharapova

The Internazionali d’Italia has a 64-player draw, a total of $1,340,000 in prize money and awards 300 points to the winner. The first round is played during the first 2 days, after which each winning player is expected to play every day until the tournament ends on May 21. This will be Hingis’ third and final clay tune-up before Roland Garros.