Flavia Pennetta will enter the Top 10 for the first time when the new Sony Ericsson WTA Tour rankings are released on Monday, and will become the first Italian tennis player to achieve the feat.

The 27-year-old Pennetta is expecting a "crazy" reaction in her native Italy when she returns home next month.

"It's a dream come true," said Pennetta, currently ranked 12th, while her career-high has been No.11 so far. "I always hoped to be one of the best players in the world and now I'm there so it's crazy."

"I have only spoken with my mum so far. I've already received I don't know how many SMS's so I think it's going to be crazy," Pennetta added.

Pennetta is now on a 15-match winning streak, having won back-to-back tournaments in Palermo and Los Angeles and then having reached the semifinals in Cincinnati (where she'll face top-ranked Dinara Safina). (source: Reuters, photo: Ralf Reinecke)

Wildcard Kim Clijsters had defeated three Top 20 players en route to the quarterfinals of the Western & Southern Financial Group Women’s Open before Russian world No.1 Dinara Safina ended the Belgian's fairytale comeback run. Final score: 6-2 7-5.

Clijsters defeated Marion Bartoli in the first round, Patty Schnyder in the second and Svetlana Kuznetsova in the third, which were her first three matches after a more than two-year-long break, but top-seeded Safina stopped the former world No.1 Clijsters from progressing further by winning only the second time in their eight encounters.

"I really felt today that Dinara played some of her best tennis that I've seen," said Clijsters, whose return after a child birth has proved to be more than promising. "I think by far that's the best she's ever played against me."

Safina will next play world No.12 Flavia Pennetta, who defeated Daniela Hantuchova in the quarterfinals one day after upsetting Venus Williams. By reaching the semis, Pennetta will have the honor of becoming the first Italian Top 10 tennis player.

The other semifinal pair will feature Russian fourth seed Elena Dementieva and Serbian fifth seed Jelena Jankovic. Dementieva defeated Caroline Wozniacki 6-2 6-1, while Jankovic lost only three games in the match against Sybille Bammer, who upset Serena Williams in the previous round. (source: ESPN, photo via Life.com)

Second seed Serena Williams has again beaten herself, as she likes to say, following her older sister Venus out of the Western and Southern Financial Group Women’s Open in Cincinnati by falling to unseeded Sybille Bammer 7-5 6-4 in the third round.

Serena Williams is not giving Bammer the pleasure of enjoying one of the best wins of her career, stating: "Anyone could have beaten me today."

The second-ranked American made loads of unforced errors and partly blamed her sore throat for the defeat.

World No.29 Sybille Bammer will next play fifth seed Jelena Jankovic, who edged ninth seed Victoria Azarenka 7-5 7-6(4) to advance to the quarterfinals. (photo by our reader Colleen)

Billie Jean King, the founder of the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour, was among 16 global luminaries to receive the 2009 Presidential Medal of Freedom from US President Barack Obama in a ceremony at the White House.

The Medal of Freedom, America's highest civilian honor, is awarded to those who make an especially significant contribution to the security or national interests of the United States, world peace, cultural or other significant public or private endeavors.

Here’s what Barack Obama said in reference to Billie Jean King:

We honor… what she did to broaden the reach of the game, to change how women athletes and women everywhere view themselves, and to give everyone – including my two daughters – a chance to compete both on the court and in life.

(source: Sony Ericsson WTA Tour)

Wildcard Kim Clijsters is still doing impressively well in her comeback after a two-year-long break and a child birth, scoring her third Top 20 victory in three matches she played since returning to competitive tennis at the Western and Southern Financial Group Women's Open. Third seed Venus Williams fell to No.14 seed Flavia Pennetta in the third round.

Clijsters started her third-round match with a 4-1 lead, and even though sixth seed Svetlana Kuznetsova leveled at 4-4, the Belgian won the set 6-4. We can safely say that Kuznetsova was saved by the challenge system in the second set. Clijsters was leading 3-0, and then 4-3, and just when we thought she broke Kuznetsova for 5-3, the Hawk-eye system said Kuznetsova's ball was in and in the end she leveled at 4-4 to eventually win the set. Still, Clijsters triumphed in the decider to defeat the sixth-ranked Russian, after victories over No.13 Marion Bartoli and No.20 Patty Schnyder.

No.14 seed Pennetta defeated third seed Venus Williams 7-6(2) 6-4 and extended her winning streak to 14 matches. The Italian won back-to-back titles in Palermo and Los Angeles, and has now reached the quarterfinals of Cincinnati.

Clijsters might face world No.1 Dinara Safina in the quarterfinals, while Pennetta, who is now 4-3 against Williams, will next play Daniela Hantuchova, the winner over seventh seed Vera Zvonareva in the third round.

Additional info: The Sony Ericsson WTA Tour made this nice video clip dedicated to Kim Clijsters’ comeback.

(photo via Life.com)

Playing only her second competitive match in more than two years, wildcard Kim Clijsters beat world No.20 Patty Schnyder 6-2 7-5 to reach the third round of the Western and Southern Financial Group Women's Open.

Don't forget that Clijsters started her comeback with a win over world No.13 Marion Bartoli!

The Belgian’s opponent in the third round will be sixth seed Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia.

Seed No.11 Ana Ivanovic suffered an upset to world No.59 Melinda Czink, despite leading by a break in both sets. Ivanovic committed 11 double faults and lost this second-round match 7-6 7-5.

And only two days ago did I read that Ivanovic had found a cure for her troubled serve!(photo: Life.com)

Dinara Safina is constantly attacked for being a world number one without winning a Grand Slam (the most brutal attacker is Serena Williams, in my opinion) and her brother Marat, the winner of two Grand Slam titles, is defending his hard-working younger sister.

Here are just some excerpts from Marat's recent interview:

She spends so much time on court.  I think she is more professional than all the players together.

Nobody believed that she going to be top 10 even two, three years ago. So look where she is right now.

So it’s a little bit ?? it gets tough on her.  But she’s there.  She’s fighting.  She’s trying.  I’m really proud of her that she can stand, and I tell everybody to **** off basically in every press conference.  I would do this way, but unfortunately she’s very polite to you guys.

And the best comment:

Q.  Now that you stopped, what about coaching her?

MARAT SAFIN:  Oh, you want me to hang myself?  (laughter.)

Safina reached the top of the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour rankings April 20, when she and Marat became the only brother-sister duo to have been No.1 in professional tennis. (photo via Life.com)

The time has come for the lovely readers of Women's Tennis Blog to get a little tennis present!

I’ve been in contact with Kevin, the editor of the Sony Ericcson WTA Tour’s website, and he was so kind as to provide me with a signed picture of Jelena Jankovic to give to one of my lucky readers. We're having a very good cooperation, so I suppose there will be more nice surprises from the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour via Women’s Tennis Blog.

As for Ana Ivanovic's signed picture, the story is the following: As you probably know, I’m a huge fan of Ana Ivanovic’s website, and logically of the team behind it. It was a long time ago that they kindly sent me an autographed picture of Ana, and I have to say they were absolutely amazing, sending me the picture within days of my request. However, only now am I distributing it further, but better late than never. I was waiting for the right occasion.

You can become eligible to win either of the two autographed pictures of Serbian tennis stars by answering the following question correctly:

How many weeks have Ana Ivanovic and Jelena Jankovic combined spent on top of the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour singles rankings?

I know the question is not too easy, so let me help you a bit: It’s a round number!

Please, submit your answers in the comments section of this post. Where it asks for your e-mail, please provide a legitimate one, as I will contact you via that e-mail.

Two of the lucky winners, chosen randomly, will each receive one of the signed pictures.

The competition will last until Saturday, August 15, 7 pm Central-European time. The winners will be contacted shortly after.

Good luck and thank you for participating!

Former world number one Kim Clijsters couldn't have marked her comeback to tennis better – the mother of a year-and-a-half old girl upset world No.13 Marion Bartoli 6-4 6-3 in the first round of the Western & Southern Financial Group Women's Open in Cincinnati.

"To have won my first match feels really good," said Clijsters, 26, who hadn't played competitively for two years. "I surprised myself a little with the way I started and then I kept fighting and trying to stay focused. I felt good out there."

Clijsters lost just five points on her way to a 4-0 lead in the first set. Bartoli then levelled before the Belgian took two more successive games to win the opening set. In the second set, Clijsters had saved two break points in the third game, before breaking Bartoli's serve in the following game for a 3-1 lead. Clijsters then held her nerve to defeat Bartoli, the titlist at this month's Bank of the West Classic, and advance to the second round where she'll face Patty Schnyder.

Additional info: Eleventh seed Ana Ivanovic recovered from losing the first set to beat world No.61 Melanie Oudin (the famous eliminator of Jelena Jankovic at this year's Wimbledon) 2-6 6-1 6-1 and reach the second round, while ninth seed Victoria Azarenka beat Kaia Kanepi 6-3 7-6(2). (photo via Life.com)

The 3rd August issue of Russian magazine called PROsport is featuring beautiful pictures of Svetlana Kuznetsova. In my opinion, Kuznetsova has never looked better.

The same magazine included equally wonderful photos of Vera Zvonareva last year. (via: Tennis Info Blog)