You take fifteen months out of tennis to recover from elbow-surgery,
then you beat the top seed in your first match back!

Iroda Tulyaganova - the powerful, athletic, versatile, voluptuous 22-
year-old with the searing two-handed backhand - stunned top-seeded
Selesian player Marion Bartoli 6-4 6-4 in a mouthwatering first-
round match at Tashkent yesterday (Tuesday 12th October).

"It was a fiercely competitive match, controversial at times, and
produced some scintillating shotmaking by both players."

This was Iroda's first professional match since Sopot in July 2003.
She had surgery on her right elbow after missing the US Open 2003.
She appeared on several commitment-lists during the spring of 2004,
but always pulled out of the tournaments before the draws were made -
apparently due to secondary injuries to other parts of her body.

Marion too has had injury-problems this year. At Birmingham she fell
and injured her hip, and was in so much pain she had to be sedated
and taken to hospital. Fortunately this injury did not turn out to
be career-threatening as first feared, but more recent problems
include blisters on her right hand that forced her to retire from
two matches, and heat-illness. Perhaps these problems made Marion a
sitting duck for Iroda.

But you look at Jelena Dokic (of whom I'm also a fan), on a nine-
match losing streak stretching back to April, and then Iroda - first
crack out of the box - picks off the top seed!

Tashkent is Iroda's hometown, and it was at the June 2000 edition of
this tournament that she won her first of three WTA Tour singles
titles (adding Vienna and Knokke-Heist in July 2001). Iroda
deliberately waited to make her comeback at Tashkent, even though
her coach Dmitry Tomashevich advised her to come back a bit earlier.

Iroda: "I wanted to make my comeback here, in Tashkent, my hometown,
where my fans will come to watch me."

Not this fan, unfortunately! ;-( I've just gathered as much
information about the match as I can from the Internet, arranged it
into a sensible chronological report, and added as much insight as I
can without actually having seen the match.


Iroda was calm in the days leading up to the tournament, apparently,
but she nearly didn't play the match after waking up to an attack of
nerves!

"It struck me suddenly this morning and I told my friend [and fellow-
player] Marta Marrero, 'How can I play?'"


"Her diamond hairclips sparkling in the mid-day sun, Iroda
Tulyaganova reaffirmed her status as the jewel in the crown of
Uzbekistan tennis."

Iroda, serving first, "began with supreme confidence, holding her
serve comfortably and then breaking Bartoli with a series of
stunning returns and drop shots." Iroda held again for 3-0.

Iroda had a chance for 5-1 on Marion's serve at 1-4, but then Marion
fought back with her powerful two-handed forehands and backhands,
and Iroda "could not sustain the intensity of her stroke-making."
Marion held, broke back, and held again for 4-4.

There was a controversial line-call on Iroda's serve at 4-4 40/30,
as one of Marion's shots was called wide by the linesman, giving
Iroda a 5-4 lead.

"Bartoli's father, sitting in the stands, lost his cool and began
shouting. He went on for a long time and the tournament supervisor
had to come and warn him before he quietened. Bartoli herself had a
few words with the umpire [H.J. Ochs] and then called for an injury
timeout."

Iroda: "I understood because they are playing in my country, my
hometown. They believe that all linesmen and women and officials
were in my favour. I didn't think they were biased."

She smiled and added: "But I needed that point."

Iroda broke Marion in the next game to win the first set 6-4.


The second set followed a break-and-counterbreak pattern, with seven
breaks in the ten games.

Iroda served for the match at 5-3, but was broken to love. She won
the match on Marion's serve in the next game - "to the delight of an
almost sellout crowd at the Tashkent Tennis Center" - and lifted her
hands in the air in triumph.

"Tulyaganova raised her right arm in triumph as a Bartoli forehand
sailed long to seal her win in an hour and 28 minutes. She then
basked in glory in front of an adoring media at the post-match
conference which seemed to go on forever. A disappointed Bartoli,
meanwhile, slunk away from the Tashkent Tennis Centre, declining to
talk to the pressmen."

Iroda: "I'm happy with my start, especially making my début after a
long break in my home country in front of the faithful supporters."


So where is Iroda's game at right now? She's suffering from a lack
of match-fitness, of course, but she overcame that against
Marion "with the mental toughness that had seen her be a top 20
player two years ago."

The main thing that's gone is her serve. Her second serve in
particular was weak against Marion, who punished it with some
aggressive returns, and Iroda served seven double faults.

Iroda: "I practiced only for one month, and that is not enough. My
serve is only 50% of what it was when I was at my peak."


In the second round, Iroda will face the winner of Antonella Serra-
Zanetti and Julia Schruff, who play their first-round match today.
This seems like a should-win match after taking out the top seed,
but I'm not taking anything for granted as Iroda has been out for so
long, and her form has been notoriously inconsistent in the past.

The most important thing is that she gets through this tournament
without reinjuring her elbow - we saw with Kim Clijsters at Hasselt
what can happen when you try to return from a long layoff with a
serious injury. I've noticed from the photos that Iroda is wearing a
tube on her right arm to protect the elbow.

Photos:
- http://www.wtatour.com/photogallery/Default.asp (select Tashkent)

Sources I used for this report:
- http://www.wtatour.com/newsroom/stories/NewsArticle_5538_rx.asp
(with photo)
- http://www.rediff.com/sports/2004/oct/12ten.htm (source of most of
the direct quotes in this report)
- http://asia.news.yahoo.com/041012/ap/d85ltrmg5.html

--
Dr. Andrew Broad
http://www.geocities.com/andrewbroad/
http://www.geocities.com/andrewbroad/tennis/
http://www.geocities.com/andrewbroad/tennis/tulya/

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/irodatulyaganova/
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/selesians/
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/jeldani/