Beating Petra Martic, Simoa Halep, third seed Alize Cornet, Chanelle Scheepers and finally in the match of two 32-year-olds Lourdes Dominguez Lino, the sixth-seeded Francesca Schiavone earned her sixth WTA title, the GP de SAR La Princesse Lalla Meryem in Morocco.

The 2010 French Open champion Schiavone saved three set points in her opening set of the claycourt tournament in Marrakech, but eventually went all the way to the title without dropping a set and even though in the final against Dominguez Lino nine games had deuces, the end score was a decisive 6-1 6-3. (source: WTA Tour, photo: Tennis Buzz)

Looks like Women's Tennis Blog's Kiddie Pics section inspired the theme of the ITF's Olympic Book, aiming to promote the 2012 London Olympic and Paralympic Tennis Events. Aspire, Inspire: Celebrating Tennis at the Olympics 2012 includes 36 world's leading players posing with photos of themselves as a child and talking about their heroes. Of course, there are other features such as players talking about their expectations from the upcoming Olympics and words of wisdom from tennis legends.

The commemorative book is not for sale, but you can win a signed copy and ahead of the Olympics an online version will be available. There is a 20-day competition already at large at the ITF website. Your task is to give a correct answer to whose childhood photo is in the picture and you could be one of the lucky winners. Every day a new photo is presented. Hint for today: Gael Monfils (photos via HCFoo's Tennis Blog)

Coming to the 2012 French Open, Varvara Lepchenko had never been past the second round of a Grand Slam, but this time she eliminated seed No.19 Jelena Jankovic in the second round and built on it by upsetting seed No.14 Francesca Schiavone, last year's finalist and the 2010 French Open champion.

The left-handed Lepchenko has beaten Schiavone two times in a month. Then ranked No.77, Lepchenko defeated Schiavone in the first round of Madrid Open 6-4 6-7(8) 6-3, while now, as a world No.63 she took the Italian out of Roland Garros with a 3-6 6-3 8-6 victory. When you look at the stats of the Roland Garros match, they were close in all the departments, Schiavone even hit one winner more, and made seven unforced errors less (37 to 44), but the contrast is the biggest in the conversion of break points, where Schiavone won just 5 of 22 (23%) and Lepchenko 6 of 14 (43%).

In the forth round, Lepchenko will play Petra Kvitova, who battled past Nina Bratchikova 6-2 4-6 6-1. There are no Williams sisters in the draw representing the USA, but we have American Sloane Stephens and Varvara Lepchenko in the fourth round. (photo: Tennis Buzz)

Just days before Roland Garros, we have two more titlists at the tournaments leading up to the claycourt Grand Slam – Agnieszka Radwanska and Francesca Schiavone.

Radwanska may not be a top contender for the Roland Garros title, vulnerable against big hitters on clay, but now that she's won the Brussels Open and taking into account the well-known fact that this season she's been defeated only by world No.1 Victoria Azarenka and Petra Cetkovska, the Pole has only reinforced her image of a hot 2012 player. It's true that Radwanska faced no Top 20 opponents en route to the Brussels title (her highest-ranked competitor was world No.25 Kaia Kanepi in the semifinals), but still it's always an achievement to take home some hardware. In the Brussels final against Simona Halep, the Romanian was serving for the set when the top-seeded Radwanska bounced back to win nine straight games for a 7-5 6-0 victory. Read more »

The biggest Australian hope, US Open champion Samantha Stosur, crashed out of the Aussie Open already in the first round, and we didn't wait for long for another Grand Slam champion to bow out, as Francesca Schiavone lost to fellow Italian Romina Oprandi the very next day, in the second round, though.

The tenth-seeded Schiavone hit an astonishing number of nine double faults, while Oprandi made none. In addition, Schiavone made 35 unforced errors to her opponent's 16, and won only 28% on the second serve, while Oprandi was three times better in that department.

"I couldn't play like I supposed and I was playing to play," Schiavone said in a post-match conference.

The 80th-ranked Oprandi, who has reached her first third round at a Grand Slam, will play Julia Goerges next. (photo: © Neal Trousdale)

Samantha Stosur lost 6-2 6-4 in the first round of the Apia International Sydney to Francesca Schiavone, which is her second straight early loss at a tournament on her home soil this year, ahead of the Australian Open, and the big expectations and her own desire to do well at the Grand Slam in her country, following her US Open title win, seem to be catching up with big-hitting Stosur.

When she won her maiden major title in September 2011 by beating Serena Williams in the final, Stosur couldn't wait to start the same quest in Australia, but now that the moment has come, she lost her second match in Brisbane and her opening match in Sydney. The 27-year-old is admitting to be falling under the pressure:

That's what makes the loss so difficult, Melbourne is coming up and I want to start playing well. I think today I certainly didn't handle that (expectation) side of things at all well.

I went into it with the right frame of mind, and got out there and it (the crowd support) kind of hit me. It did kind of surprise me how much it kind of hamstrung me today.

Stosur played the Australian Open main draw nine times and has never been past the fourth round. Do you think she will overcome the pressure and improve her Australian Open result armed with a Grand Slam triumph experience? (photo: Stephane Martinache)

Never in their eight previous matches in the period of eight years, from 2002 to 2010, had Francesca Schiavone beaten Venus Williams, and at the December 3rd exhibition event in Milan, the Italian managed to beat both the Williams sisters, on top of showing her dancing skills by entertaining the 11,000 crowd to Michael Jackson's "Beat It" with Flavia Pennetta.

Schiavone defeated Venus 7-5 7-3, and then Serena 7-3 8-10 8-6. Pennetta also beat Venus, 7-6 7-2, but lost to Serena 6-8 7-3 7-3. The Williams sisters won the doubles 3-7 8-6 8-6.

Neither of the Williams sisters played competitive tennis since the US Open, however they did play another exhibition match recently, last month in Columbia, and Venus defeated Serena 6-4 7-6(5). (source: ESPN)

Top seed Francesca Schiavone lost in the opening round of the Hansol Korea Open to Vera Dushevina. It is actually Dushevina’s third victory over Schiavone in their four matches, but the first one in straight sets.

The world No.8 Schiavone, 57 places higher in the WTA rankings than Dushevina, lost the first set in a tiebreak 7-6(4) and succumbed in the second set 6-2.

The highest seed at the tournament is now No.2 Marion Bartoli, who defeated Nuria Llagostera Vives 6-2 6-2 in the first round and will play Vania King in the second. Bartoli won their last two meetings, including this year in Brisbane 6-1 6-2. (photo: © Neal Trousdale)