Ana Ivanovic

Early life

Ivanovic was born in Belgrade, SFR Yugoslavia. Ivanovic's mother Dragana, a lawyer, has been courtside during most of her matches. Her father Miroslav, a self-employed businessman, attended as many events as he possibly could. Ivanovic has a younger brother, Miloš, with whom she loved to play basketball.

Ivanovic first picked up a racket at the age of five after watching Monica Seles, a fellow Yugoslav, on television. She started her career after memorizing the telephone number of a local tennis clinic from an advertisement. During the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, she was forced to train during the morning to avoid bombardments. Later, she admitted that she trained in an abandoned swimming pool in the winter, as no tennis facilities were available. When she was 15, Ivanovic spent four hours in a locker room crying after a defeat – the first that her new manager had witnessed. She thought that Dan Holzmann, the manager in question, would abandon her, thinking her not good enough to become a professional tennis player. However,he has remained her manager to this day.

Career

2004: Rising star

Ivanovic reached the final of the Junior Wimbledon tournament in 2004, losing to Kateryna Bondarenko. In 2004, she went 26–0 on the ITF circuit, and won all five events that she entered, two of them as a qualifier. As a qualifier in Zürich, she overcame a 5–1 third set deficit along with two match points to defeat world No. 29 Tatiana Golovin. She then debuted in the qualifying draw of a Major at the US Open, where she was defeated by Lioudmila Skavronskaia after winning the first set 6–1 and having two match points in the 3rd set. Her first notable breakthrough occurred in the next tournament, when she took Venus Williams to two tiebreaks, before losing in straight sets in the second round of the Zürich Open. She had held several set points in both sets. She followed up her run in Zürich with a quarterfinal showing at Luxembourg the next week.

2005: First WTA title

Ivanovic won her first career singles title early in the year at the Canberra International, after defeating Melinda Czink in the final. Her ranking continued to rise after wins over Svetlana Kuznetsova in Miami, Nadia Petrova also in Miami, and Vera Zvonareva in Warsaw, all of whom were top 10 players. Ivanovic lost to Amélie Mauresmo at the Australian Open in the third round, at Doha in the third round after holding a 6–2, 2–0 lead, and at the Miami Masters in the quarter finals. However, Ivanovic's biggest win to date then came over Mauresmo in the third round of the French Open. Ivanovic advanced to the quarter-finals of only her second Grand Slam tournament by defeating future French Open champion Francesca Schiavone in the fourth round. Later in the year, Ivanovic reached the semifinals of the Zurich Open and Generali Ladies Linz, losing to Patty Schnyder in both tournaments. Ivanovic finished the year ranked No. 16.

Ivanovic started the season at the Hopman Cup in Perth, Australia with fellow Serbian Novak Djokovic, where the pair narrowly missed the final. To start off her WTA year, she played at the Medibank International in Sydney where she once again defeated Amélie Mauresmo, this time in straight sets, before falling to Svetlana Kuznetsova in the quarterfinals. A week later, she lost to Samantha Stosur in the second round of the Australian Open.

Ivanovic made it to the third round of the French Open, before losing to Anastasia Myskina. She progressed to the fourth round at Wimbledon, but lost to eventual champion and world No. 1 Amélie Mauresmo in straight sets after beating No. 14 seed Dinara Safina.

Ivanovic made her breakthrough in August 2006 by defeating a formerly ranked No. 1 Martina Hingis in the final of the Rogers Cup in Montreal before beating Jelena Janković, No. 14 seed Katarina Srebotnik and top 10 player Dinara Safina. This ultimately led to her winning the United States Open Series, ahead of Kim Clijsters and Maria Sharapova. At the US Open, she lost to Serena Williams.

Ivanovic also played nine tournaments in doubles in 2006, teaming up with Maria Kirilenko and Sania Mirza. Ivanovic and Kirilenko made two semifinals and a final; they ended the year at number 17 in the annual race to the Championships. Ivanovic finished the year ranked world No. 14 in singles and world No. 51 in doubles.

2007: First Grand Slam final and entering the top 10

Ivanovic started the season in Gold Coast and Sydney where she reached quarterfinals. Seeded 13th at the Australian Open, Ivanovic defeated Agnieszka Radwańska in the second round, but lost in the third round to Vera Zvonareva. Immediately after this tournament, she announced that she had split with her coach David Taylor. Ivanovic then played in the 2007 Toray Pan Pacific Open. In the quarterfinals she beat No. 10 Jelena Janković, and in the semifinals she beat No. 1 Maria Sharapova when Sharapova was forced to retire but after Ivanovic won first set, but she lost in the final to Martina Hingis.

On American hard court season, Ivanovic lost in early rounds. But on clay, Ivanovic first went on to semifinal of Amelia Island and then managed to win her first Tier I clay court title in Berlin, defeating No. 4 Svetlana Kuznetsova in the final in three sets. Ivanovic needed a tie-break to finally finish the match. The win in Berlin propelled her into the top ten of the WTA Rankings for the first time, at world No. 8.

Ivanovic had a six-match winning streak heading into the French Open and increased this streak to twelve by reaching the final. She won her first three matches with the loss of only nine games. In her second career quarterfinal at Roland Garros, Ivanovic defeated world No. 3 Kuznetsova, and she then beat world No. 2 Sharapova in less than one hour in the semifinals. In the final, Ivanovic attempted to win her first Major singles title and complete a sweep of the top three players in the world. However, world No. 1 and two-time defending champion Justine Henin won the match in straight sets.

At Wimbledon, Ivanovic defeated world No. 9 Nadia Petrova in the fourth round, and saved three match points to defeat Nicole Vaidišová in the quarterfinals. In the semifinals, three-time former Wimbledon champion Venus Williams defeated Ivanovic in two sets after Ivanovic had a break in the second set.

A persistent knee injury sustained at Wimbledon caused Ivanovic to withdraw from Serbian Fed Cup competition against Slovakia and two lead-up events to the US Open. She returned to the tour at the East West Bank Classic in Carson, California, saving two match points in the semifinals with huge winner before defeating No. 3 Janković in three sets. In the final, Ivanovic defeated top 10 player Petrova to win the fourth singles title of her career, which raised her ranking to a career-high of world No. 4.

In Ivanovic's first three matches at the US Open, she lost only 10 games. Venus Williams then eliminated her for the second consecutive time at a Major.

Ivanovic returned to Europe for three tournaments. At the Tier II Luxembourg Championships, Ivanovic qualified for the 2007 WTA Tour Championships by virtue of reaching the semifinals. In the final, Ivanovic rallied from 3–6, 0–3 down to defeat Daniela Hantuchová in two hours and 25 minutes. This was her fifth career title. In the quarterfinals and semifinals she beat Tatiana Golovin and Vera Zvonareva.

To end the year, Ivanovic played in the Sony Ericsson Championships in Madrid, Spain. Seeded fourth and assigned to the Red Group during the round-robin phase, she defeated world No. 2 Kuznetsova and then Hantuchová in straight sets. She qualified for the semifinals but Sharapova defeated Ivanovic in the final match of the round-robin stage. Because she finished second in her group, Ivanovic played world No. 1 Henin in the semifinals, in which the Belgian won in two sets.

Ivanovic finished the year with a career-high ranking of world No. 4.

2008: French Open champion and world No. 1

Ivanovic started the year at the 2008 Medibank International, where she made the quarterfinals, eventually losing to world No. 1 Justine Henin despite having had break points in the third set. As the fourth seed at the Australian Open, Ivanovic made it all the way to the finals, beating top-10 players Venus Williams for the first time in her career, and coming back from a 0–6, 0–2 deficit against Daniela Hantuchová. She was given the nickname "Aussie Ana" during the on-court interview with Todd Woodbridge following the victory over Williams. Ivanovic fell against world No. 5 Maria Sharapova in a tight match in the final where Ivanovic had 0–30 at 5–4 in first set. Her ranking rose to world No. 3 as a result of her performance at the tournament, the highest of her career at the time.

2006: Big break through

In Serbia's Fed Cup Europe/Africa Zone Group I D round-robin tie against Poland, Romania and Netherlands Ivanovic won all of her matches, as Serbia advanced to the World Group II playoffs in April. And soon Serbia qualified for World Group II, after beating neighboring country Croatia.

In March, Ivanovic defeated Svetlana Kuznetsova in the final of the Tier I Pacific Life Open in Indian Wells, California before wins over top-15 players Francesca Schiavone, Vera Zvonareva, and world No. 4 Jelena Janković, in the semifinals. She lost to Lindsay Davenport in the third round of the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami the following week in straight sets.

Ivanovic started her clay-court season as defending champion at the Qatar Telecom German Open in Berlin where she lost to Elena Dementieva for the fourth time in four meetings in the semifinals. In Rome she lost to qualifier Tsvetana Pironkova, but it couldn't demoralize Ivanovic, as she defeated Petra Cetkovská 6–0, 6–0 in the fourth round, No. 10 Patty Schnyder in the quarterfinals, and No. 3 Jelena Janković in a thrilling encounter in the semifinals of 2008 French Open. She went on to defeat Dinara Safina in straight sets in the final, winning her first (and to date, only) Major singles title.