Brisbane International Tennis - Australian Open Series

Day 5 preview

Jaime San Martin/Image: SMP Images Thursday 7 January 2010 Comments

Brisbane International 2010 enters its decisive stages with the start of quarterfinal action on day 5.

First match of the day at Pat Rafter Arena sees crowd favourite Ana Ivanovic take on young Russian Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova. This will be the second time they’ve met, with their previous meeting a two-set victory for the Serbian at Indian Wells last year.

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Title holder Radek Stepanek plays against Wayne Odesnik of the United States in the second match of the day at Pat Rafter Arena.

Justine Henin will be back on centre court after her straight sets victory last night to try and break Melinda Czink’s resistance in what will be their first encounter. Former world number one Henin is yet to drop a set in her comeback tournament.

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Daniela Hantuchova of Slovakia has been impressive so far in Brisbane, dropping only one set in a tiebreaker on her way to facing Andrea Petkovic of Germany in the quarterfinals.

Hantuchova announced after her second-round victory against Agnes Szavay that she will concentrate on her singles career this season in order to improve her ranking.

The winner of that match earns the right to play against either Kim Clijsters of Belgium or Lucie Safarova of the Czech Republic. Number-one seeded Clijsters has only dropped six games so far in the tournament, while her opponent Safarova produced one of the upsets of the second round by defeating sixth-seeded Aleksandra Wozniak of Canada 6-1 6-3.

Closing the day at Pat Rafter Arena and following the Clijsters versus Safarova match will be American James Blake against French No.3 seed Gael Monfi ls. Blake will hope his reserves of luck haven’t run out after his second-round escape act against Marc Gicquel, while Monfils will be looking for some extra fuel after a tight schedule en-route to the quarterfinals.

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Tags: Ana Ivanovic, Andrea Petkovic, Daniela Hantuchova, Gael Monfils, James Blake, Justine Henin, Kim Clijsters, Lucie Safarova, Radek Stepanek, Wayne Odesnik

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